The Author introduces this book as a "radical reappraisal" of Jacques Derrida,s work, undertaken in the attempt to maintain Derrida studies as a viable field of scholarly inquiry. Dividing Derrida interpretation into two camps; one focused on language, characterising deconstruction as a radical form of skepticism, the other maintaining the traditional authority of philosophy despite the doubt expressed in Derrida,s talk of impossibility. However widely and differently, Jacques Derrida may be viewed as a "foundational" French thinker, the most basic questions concerning his work still remain unanswered. This book seeks to address some questions by returning to what it claims is essential history: the development of Derrida,s core thought through his engagement with Husserlian phenomenology. A fundamental reinterpretation of Derrida,s project and the works for which he is best known, the author’s study fashions a new manner of working with the French thinker that respects the radical singularity of his thought as well as the often different aims of those he reads. Such a view is in fact "essential" if Derrida studies are to remain a vital field of scholarly inquiry, and if the humanities, more generally, are to have access to a replenishing source of living theoretical concerns.