The article gives an account of the encounter between Jacques Derrida and Hans-Georg Gadamer at the Goethe Institute in Paris in April 1981. The article discusses disagreement between Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics and Derrida’s deconstruction. The main aim is to show why hermeneutical “good will to understand” cannot be reduced to “metaphysics of presence”. Another aim is to explicate possible interconnections between hermeneutics and deconstruction strategies.

Keywords: hermeneutics; dialectics of question and answer; deconstruction; good will to understand; meaning; metaphysics of presence.

DOI: 10.3846/coactivity.2010.04