Stern, MichaelMahan, William2013-10-032013-10-032013-10-03https://hdl.handle.net/1794/13304My thesis is an argument that writing is a struggle of imprisonment and freedom. I argue that a text gains a certain level of power, such that it controls the writer, reader, and critic alike. Yet at the same time, the work presents all of these people with a possibility of freedom, seducing them in with the task of sharing the text's `secret' or deeper meaning via indirect communication. This `imprisonment' is voluntary if the reader wishes to engage with the text in a way that opens the text for a revelation of a deeper meaning, unique to each reader. The writer offers his text as a `gift', an idea heavily influenced by Jacques Derrida's writings in The Gift of Death. I argue that that the presence and absence of the secret is one element of the author's work, which creates the relationship of confinement and freedom identified with writing.en-USAll Rights Reserved.DerridaFreedomKierkegaardMeaningSecretWritingElectronic Thesis or Dissertation