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Deleuze, The Dark Precursor

Dialectic, Structure, Being

Eleanor Kaufman

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A thoughtful and original analysis of the writings of influential French philosopher Gilles Deleuze.

Gilles Deleuze is considered one of the most important French philosophers of the twentieth century. Eleanor Kaufman situates Deleuze in relation to others of his generation, such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Pierre Klossowski, Maurice Blanchot, and Claude Lévi-Strauss, and she engages the provocative readings of Deleuze by Alain Badiou and Slavoj Žižek.

Deleuze, The Dark Precursor is organized around three themes that critically overlap: dialectic, structure, and being. Kaufman argues that Deleuze's...

A thoughtful and original analysis of the writings of influential French philosopher Gilles Deleuze.

Gilles Deleuze is considered one of the most important French philosophers of the twentieth century. Eleanor Kaufman situates Deleuze in relation to others of his generation, such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Pierre Klossowski, Maurice Blanchot, and Claude Lévi-Strauss, and she engages the provocative readings of Deleuze by Alain Badiou and Slavoj Žižek.

Deleuze, The Dark Precursor is organized around three themes that critically overlap: dialectic, structure, and being. Kaufman argues that Deleuze's work is deeply concerned with these concepts, even when he advocates for the seemingly opposite notions of univocity, nonsense, and becoming. By drawing on scholastic thought and reading somewhat against the grain, Kaufman suggests that these often-maligned themes allow for a nuanced, even positive reflection on apparently negative states of being, such as extreme inertia. This attention to the negative or minor category has implications that extend beyond philosophy and into feminist theory, film, American studies, anthropology, and architecture.

Reviews

Reviews

Kaufman’s book on Deleuze is an exemplary work, carefully argued and thought provoking. The line of discussion is lucidly presented and well conceived.

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Book Details

Publication Date
Status
Available
Trim Size
6
x
9
Pages
264
ISBN
9781421405896
Illustration Description
1 line drawing
Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Deleuze's Scholasticism
Part One: Dialectic
1. Solid Dialectic in Sartre and Deleuze
2. Toward a Feminist Philosophy of Mind
3. Klossowski and Orthodoxy
4. Cinema and the

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Deleuze's Scholasticism
Part One: Dialectic
1. Solid Dialectic in Sartre and Deleuze
2. Toward a Feminist Philosophy of Mind
3. Klossowski and Orthodoxy
4. Cinema and the Tableau Vivant
Part Two: Structure
5. Betraying Well (zizek and Badiou)
6. Lévi-Strauss and the Joy of Abstraction
7. Extreme Formality and the World without Others
Part Three: Being
8. French Thought and the Space of American Literature
9. Bartleby, the Immobile
10. In the Middle of Things
11. Midnight, or the Inertia of Being
12. Living Virtually in a Cluttered House
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Author Bio
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Eleanor Kaufman

Eleanor Kaufman is a professor of comparative literature, English, and French and Francophone studies, as well as an affiliate in Jewish studies and the Center for the Study of Religion at the University of California, Los Angeles. She is author of The Delirium of Praise: Bataille, Blanchot, Deleuze, Foucault, Klossowski and coeditor of Deleuze and Guattari: New Mappings in Politics, Philosophy...