Review Of "The Architecture Of Exile" By S. Tigerman

Document Type

Book Review

Publication Date

12-1-1988

Published In

Choice

Abstract

At one point in this book, the reader is told that Jachin and Boaz, the two pillars in front of the Temple of Solomon, allude to the spindles of the Torah and thus mark the passage into the Text beyond. Such speculation, compelling as it is historically aberrant, typifies this volume. Retracing Mark C. Taylor's Erring (CH, Mar '88) (and so echoing Derrida's absent presence), Tigerman guides us, errantly as well as gallantly, in four thematic segments (Sign, Challenge, Displacement, and Exile), a deconstructionist reading of architecture qua text, and its myth and history, from the Paradise and the Tower of Babel through the Solomonic Temple, to the churches and urban forms of the Renaissance. Unlike his earlier, more personal musing, Versus: An American Architect's Alternatives (CH Nov '82), this book is civilizational and theological in scope; and while his scholarship may annoy the historian's historic sense (as in the architectural examples he erratically uses as evidences, which thus at times ill serve his arguments), Tigerman's intellectual prowess and literary verve create a work that is provocative as well as revealing of its author's deep architectural concerns. Recommended for all interested in Jewish thought, biblical archaeology, postmodern criticism, and architecture--historical and contemporary.

Comments

This work is freely available courtesy of Choice Reviews. The review has been reproduced in full in the abstract field.

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