The Impossibility of Pure Language: Derrida on Aristotle’s Definition of Metaphor Introduction

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Introduction

In his Poetics, Aristotle offered one of the most cited definitions of metaphor: it consists, he writes, in “giving the thing a name that belongs to something else” (Poetics 1457b6–9). Jacques Derrida recalls this formula in Margins of Philosophy (p. 231), where it becomes the point of departure for a wide-ranging deconstruction of the philosophical dream of literal language. If metaphor is alien naming, then its opposite must be authentic naming: a speech where every entity possesses its own proper designation. This apparent alternative, Derrida argues, is precisely what metaphysicians have pursued—the fantasy of a discourse purified of figurative intrusion. Yet the very idea of such purity is internally compromised, since it is framed through metaphors of ownership, propriety, and transfer.

Aristotle’s Definition and Its Implications

Aristotle’s wording situates metaphor as a form of displacement: a name is carried across from its rightful home to an alien domain. This description assumes that names are normally attached to their natural objects in a direct, self-sufficient way. In this sense, the non-metaphorical would be the regime of proper names—expressions belonging uniquely and exclusively to the things they designate. Aristotle does not himself elaborate a philosophy of literalness, but his opposition between “one’s own” (kurios) and “alien” (allotrios) already suggests such a distinction.

Derrida’s Re-reading in Margins

When Derrida reintroduces Aristotle’s definition, he stresses its latent presuppositions. To classify metaphor as a borrowing implies that some words enjoy unborrowed, legitimate possession. This sets up the ideal of a language of purity, the idiom of truth to which metaphysical discourse has always aspired. According to Derrida, however, this ideal is self-defeating: the very opposition between proper and improper, authentic and alien, is constructed out of metaphors of belonging. To invoke “propriety” in order to secure a realm beyond metaphor is to be caught in the very figures one seeks to exclude.

The Consequences of the Inference

The consequences of this analysis are profound. First, the dream of a non-metaphorical language appears incoherent, since the very notion of authenticity or propriety is metaphorical. Second, metaphysical systems turn out to recycle what they attempt to expel: in protecting meaning from figurative contamination, they merely refurbish and normalize already existing tropes. This is what Derrida calls a process of “bleaching” or “whitening,” whereby metaphors fade into transparency and come to appear as literal concepts.

Consider everyday expressions: the leg of a table, the foot of a mountain, the act of grasping a concept. Each began as a figurative extension, yet their figurative origin is often forgotten. Philosophy operates similarly: terms like ground, origin, essence, or foundation carry metaphorical lineages which, over time, are masked by their institutionalization within conceptual discourse. To seek an absolutely literal register is therefore to forget this genealogical process and to fall back into the very play of metaphor one disavows.

Metaphor and Metaphysics in Reciprocal Antagonism

This explains Derrida’s claim that metaphor and metaphysics circle one another in a relation of reciprocal antagonism. Metaphysics aspires to the literal and treats metaphor as a secondary, defective deviation. Yet the concept of metaphor itself depends on a figurative network of transfer, alienation, and propriety. Thus, metaphysics cannot define its own purity without presupposing what it denies. The more philosophy insists on a language of essence, the more it unwittingly recycles figurative structures.

Conclusion

Aristotle’s definition of metaphor, while apparently simple, carries within it the seeds of a paradox. By construing metaphor as alien naming, it simultaneously gestures toward the ideal of a proper, non-metaphorical language. Derrida shows that this ideal is unattainable, since the very discourse of propriety is metaphorical through and through. What appears to be the bedrock of literal meaning is nothing but a sedimentation of bleached figures, endlessly circling around the very tropes philosophy hopes to transcend. Far from being a superficial ornament, metaphor proves constitutive of language itself, and metaphysics remains inseparable from its figurative undercurrents.

References

Aristotle. (1995). Poetics (S. H. Butcher, Trans.). In J. Barnes (Ed.), The complete works of Aristotle (Vol. 2, pp. 2316–2340). Princeton University Press. (Original work ca. 335 BCE)

Derrida, J. (1982). Margins of philosophy (A. Bass, Trans.). University of Chicago Press.

Rée, J. (1994). Metaphor and metaphysics. New Literary History, 25(4), 639–663.