[For Derrida there was perhaps only one question that ever interested him - the question of justice. Justice, for him, always remains to come; it is simply not possible, therefore, to expect justice to be done on the basis of courtroom decisions and legal precedents, and yet this is no cause - far from it - to give up on justice (see Derrida, 'Force of Law', and Lucy, A Derrida Dictionary, 62-65). But while the question of justice could be said to have been an abiding concern of Derrida's, it is not a question he always addressed directly. Similarly, we might see that John's interest in the question of justice is an important, if often 'subterranean', theme throughout this book. Here, he responds to that question openly, by way of its relations - of course - to poetry. -NL (Niall Lucy)]