Jean-Francois Lyotard is one of the most celebrated proponents of what has become known as the 'postmodern'. More than almost any other contemporary theorist, he has explored the relations between knowledge, art, politics and history, in ways that offer radical new possibilities for thinking about modern culture. Simon Malpas introduces students to issues at the heart of Lyotard's work, includ…
This is the first detailed assessment of the life and work of Felix Guattari--"Mr. Anti" as the French press labelled him--the friend of and collaborator with Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Lacan and Antonio Negri, and one of the 20th Century's last great activist-intellectuals. Guattari is widely known for his celebrated writings with Deleuze, but these writings do not represent the true breadth and …
Before publishing his landmark Meditations in 1641, Rene Descartes sent his manuscript to many leading thinkers to solicit their objections to his arguments. He included these objections, along with his own detailed replies, as part of the first edition. This unusual strategy gave Descartes a chance to address criticisms in advance and to demonstrate his willingness to consider diverse viewpoin…
Dissemination is a thought-provoking book on the very nature of language which is used in our daily lives. The philosophies described in this book make a person question the various nuances of language. In Dissemination, the author states that absence, dispersal and the risk of unmeaning are some of the risks by which all language is plagued. He also says that due to this malady the distinct…
A love of Cioran creates an urge to press his writing into someone's hand, and is followed by an equal urge to pull it away as poison."--The New Yorker In this volume, which reaffirms the uncompromising brilliance of his mind, Cioran strips the human condition down to its most basic components, birth and death, suggesting that disaster lies not in the prospect of death but in the fact of birth,…