Ursus Sacer: Sovereignty and Bear Life in Heinrich Heine’s “Atta Troll”

The pun in the title works only in English, of course—a play on Giorgio Agamben’s “Homo Sacer: Sovereignty and Bare Life”. Yet, as happens often, translation can bring to light something in the original that is otherwise obscured. In this instance, the translation allows a play between “bare life” (mere life, “das bloße Leben”), as a particular element of human existence, and “bear life” (“Bärenleben”), as one form of nonhuman existence. Or, it allows for a reflection on the relationship between human and nonhuman forms of life. In so far as Agamben’s book poses questions about human life, matters of sovereignty, and the nature of rights, the pun enables an inquiry into the role of nonhuman life in those same domains. That is, it lets us ask: what role does nonhuman life serve in the formation of structures of sovereignty and in the elaboration of a regime of rights?