'Pataphilology

What do the bizzare etymologies of Jean-Pierre Brisset, made-up languages for literary fiction, The Dialectic of Enlightenment, Latin grammarians, Horace's Epodes, and the Papyrus of Ani have in common? Absolutely nothing. Yet, taken together they provide an unusually coherent picture of a hitherto unacknowledged non-tradition of linguistic investigation. At these moments, particularly within the traditions of European writing which can loosely be termed "avant-garde," philology goes rogue, hearkening to unearthly imperatives and barely comprehended intimations, and producing results well beyond those generated by more respectable - and supposedly more grounded - philological endeavors. 'Pataphilology: An Irreader seeks to document and analyze such moments of philological speculation, invention, and détournement. In using the term 'pataphilology, Gurd and van Gerven Oei are not proposing a facile analogy with 'pataphysics, where 'pataphilology would be philology's wacky twin, always out for a lark, never doing anything real. This would presuppose an operation (even if parenthetical) on philology analogous to a shift from physics to 'pataphysics, something which Alfred Jarry, to who