stankovic, sasa thesis.pdf - Atrium - University of Guelph

can in some sense live the being in itself of the past in the same way that we live the passive
synthesis of habit” (DR 84). In other words, Deleuze asks, how we can constitute time as pure
past in the way we constitute time as the living present in contemplation. “The entire past is
conserved in itself, but how can we save it for ourselves, how can we penetrate that in itself
without reducing it to the former present that it was, or to the present present in relation to which
it is past? How can we save it for ourselves?” (DR 84). It is crucial to remember here that
Deleuze does not give one answer to this question, but rather two. These are reminiscence, the
second synthesis of time, and the eternal return, the third synthesis of time. Let us look at each of
these two syntheses of time in relation to the first syntheses of time.
“Moreover, it seems that the response has long been known: reminiscence. In effect, this
designates a passive synthesis, an involuntary memory which differs in kind from any active
synthesis associated with voluntary memory” (DR 84-5). Reminiscence is different than active
memory to the extent that it is does not reminisce anything that ever actually was. Instead,
reminiscence reminisces the pure past or the power of passage of living presents. “Combray
reappears, not as it was or as it could be, but in a splendour which was never lived, like a pure
past which finally reveals its double irreducibility to the two presents which it telescopes
together: the present that it was, but also the present present which it could be” (DR 85). In this
sense, if contemplation is one synthesis of the passive self, reminiscence is another. In other
words, reminiscence is a different kind of contraction or repetition than contemplation. “If we
compare the passive synthesis of habit and the passive synthesis of memory, we see how much
the distribution of repetition and contraction changes from one to the other” (DR 82).
Contemplation is a contraction or a repetition of independent instants into a living present.
However, reminiscence is a contraction or a repetition of the pure past into a living present. “No
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