“Roots, an invention of grammarians (in other words, a theoretical fiction – but language theory is no more fictive than any other field of study). Or, Schegel says, “just as the name tells us,” “a living germ always at work in language.” Just as the name tells us (the name here, being “root”): this appeal to the name shows the circular reasoning – the circularity from which all languages draw their fecundity: the root having been named by analogy with plant growth and with the supposed unity of germinating principle hidden beneath the earth, we draw from there the idea that the root is the formative germ by which words, in diverse languages, receive the power of development, and creative enrichment.”

– Maurice Blanchot, The Writing of the Disaster

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