Barthes and Idiorrythmia A Study of Carnets du voyage en Chine

In 1974, Barthes travels to China with members of the French avant-garde literary magazine Tel Quel. His notes give an account of the discomfort he felt during this trip. In this article, we will show how this uneasiness is due to the imposition of a schedule that disrespects his subjective temporality. Barthes thus anticipates the “idiorrhythmic fantasy” he theorized two years later, during his first course at the Collège de France.