How did Derrida’s book Glas use its two-column format to explore language and ideas?

In his 1974 experimental work Glas, Jacques Derrida utilized a two-column format to challenge traditional modes of philosophical writing and explore the generative power of language.

One column is dedicated to an analysis of key concepts within the philosophy of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, while the other presents a suggestive discussion of the work and life of the thief, novelist, and playwright Jean Genet. By placing these disparate texts side-by-side, Derrida employs juxtaposition to disrupt linear reading and highlight the tensions between different systems of thought. This structural choice serves to demonstrate how language can incite new ways of thinking, moving beyond simple exposition to engage the reader in the active, infinite play of meaning that is central to deconstruction.1