Introduction

There is no doubt that for Ricoeur, reading is not an unthought-of act; on the contrary, it is part of his philosophical reflection. Whether it is because he reads the texts of other philosophers, commenting on them extensively, quoting them, or asserting that these texts are fundamental philosophical references to him, whether it is because he quotes, studies or comments on a wide range of extra-philosophical texts, including scientific, logical, linguistic, structuralist or literary-theoretical works, or whether it is because he himself interprets literary works and biblical or theological texts, it is easy to agree that Ricoeur has developed a conscious and intensive reading practice in his writings. The first impression left by his style is that of a thinker who favors dialogue and values intersubjectivity. Better still: could we not say that his need to feed off the texts of others bears witness to an ever-growing demand for himself to invent the creative conceptual means likely to mark his own singularity? What we are saying, in any case, is that for Ricoeur, the activity of reading is much more about sharing his readings with his own readers than about a reductive fidelity to the source text. And to be able to honor the virtue of sharing, we may have to start by avoiding all the traps of authority, especially the one into which a canonical text read by a philosopher too sure of his own reading could lead us.