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Deleuze & Guattari

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23:12 / 17.02.05

I get more nervous posting in here than I do in the Temple, but I wanted to ask this and I think it could be of help to others so I'll ask :

At some point this year I want to learn about the theories of Deleuze & Guattari, so here's a few questions, feel free to answer as many as you like if you want to :

Where should I start with them in the way of books?

Are they in the same area as Baudrillard and Derrida? One of them, both, or none?

If yes to one or both in part of the last question, how do they compare with the previous two (or one) and can they really be compared? If no to the last question or not really, in what ways do they differ?

Are these (where, in at least one of those cases) people in the field that could be defined as modern day philosophy or isn't what they do even comparable to philosophy? Is it closer to Science?

Feel free to move this thread if it's no good here for whatever reason, but I thought this the best place to ask.

00:01 / 18.02.05

i'm not sure what is around in the way of intros. i think massumi has something out and he's probably as good as anyone. i would recommend just jumping in the deep end and getting a thousand plateaus. with philosophy like this i would be extremely wary of other peoples interpretations. however, it's probably helpful when starting out i guess. bonta and protevi have a book out with a d/g glossary which may be of use when trying to get to grips with d/g's neologisms. so maybe get thousand plateaus and have the glossary on hand to help with all those concepts getting thrown out at you.
not sure about the baudrillard and derrida thing. not familar enough with baudrillard to really state anything of any value. i saw a book looking at both deleuze and derrida at work so you may want to track this down if you're really interested. i can find out the details if you want. i haven't read it myself yet. i'm picking there's probably various overlapping of themes to be found between these philosophers considering they all were a part of the same intellectual milieu.
these individuals are definately not scientists. a lot of scholars wouldn't even want to consider them philosophers. but fuck them. they wouldnt know true philosophy it it bit them on the ass. plato and co would be spinning in their graves if they could see the dry and spiritually bereft forms of philosphy that predominant anglo-american academies.
i consider d/g indispensible material for anyone with 'lith related interests. someone suggested some kind of reading/discussion thread on thousand plateau's a while back, which might be a good idea. i've often thought of starting one. but with my schedule as it is i doubt i would be able to contribute as much as i would like. everytime i open that book i feel like i can get lost for days. not something i can digest during my coffee breaks at work. wonderful stuff.
oh, if you have any interest in nietzsche, deleuze's book on him is magnificient. i have only just started it in prep for an upcoming paper and his interpretation his superb. he has a nice condensed essay on his interpretation of nietzsche in pure immanence, which you may prefer to read instead if your schedule is anything like mine.

15:50 / 18.02.05

I should preface this response by saying I haven't really read much, and don't really know what I'm talking about. Infact, all that I have done is read the Routledge introduction (Gilles Deleuze by Claire Colebrook, its well written, very erudite and informative), and skimmed a little of Deleuze's work in bookstores.

So, taking that into account, I've been recommended to start with his work on Proust (Proust and Signs) if you're after his take on literature (athough i also introduces many of his philosophical concerns). For the Philosopher, his earlier works on key philosophers (particularly the book on Hume - Empiricism and Subjectivity) are meant to be quite clear.

If you want to just dive in to his main works, I've been told its best to just focus on a single chapter, instead of the mammoth task of a whole book. The third chapter of Difference and Repitition, the fourth section of Anti-Oedipus, and the tenth plateau in A Thousand Plateaus have all been recommended as good places to start. What is philosophy? has also been recommended as a good beginning for studying their joint works.

I can't say I'll be able to help with any specific problems, but I can atleast have a go. If you do get around to reading any of the aformentioned, please report back and say how it went!

18:08 / 18.02.05

This is a big help, thanks to the both of you for the info.

For now I'll have a look through some of the linkshere and see what I can work out, but as soon as I get some spare cash I'll get hold of one of those suggestions.

Thanks again.

18:24 / 18.02.05

trebor, thanks for the heads up on the proust book. i was only aware of the one on kafka.

xyu, why the $$$ concern? does your local library not have anything by d/g?

18:56 / 18.02.05

Yeah I could try that I guess. I owe the city library 18 quid, but if the village library isn't connected on my card I could order it from there...

I'll have money soon anyway. And it annoys me when I want to check back on the book for info and I no longer have it.

Thanks anyway, I'll look into that.

sdv (non-human)

13:17 / 21.02.05

Sorry i usually merely lurk.

Might I suggest the following:

1.

sdv (non-human)

13:29 / 21.02.05

Sorry - mis-hit keys... as i almost said I lurk on this list as it's the wrong form for me - also join the deleuze list at www.driftline.org which is dedicated to the discussion of the work at all levels --- they should be delighted to 'speak' to you...

Dialogues: Deleuze/Parnet - very useful set of texts from the period between Anti-O and ATP. Half deleuze and half parnet. Useful as an introduction into the work.

For Deleuze - esssential reading is his book on Nietszche. Then AO and ATP...

For secondary texts:
Try Paul Pattons text: Deleuze and Politics, and James Williams guide to Difference and Repeition. After that DeLanda and Brian Massumi's work...

There is a wealth of other material - but the key to remember is that once you begin the work the ONLY way you can validate the key 'ideas' in the philosophy of Deleuze and Deleuze/Guattari is to investigate the accuracy and understanding of the often difficult concepts they are dealing with.

Oh - yes significance of - Deleuze is one of the great 20th C philosophers - as significant in his way as for example Heidegger, Sartre and Wittgenstein to name but a few

Mostly however just enjoy the process...

steve

17:16 / 21.02.05

Xyu, don't mean to offend, but if you didn't know that D&G aren't scientists, or - more fundamentally - if you don't know the difference philosophers and scientists, I'd suggest reading a few introductory texts (Philosophy for Beginners, that sort of thing) before tackling the big guns.

I'm only saying because primary philosophy texts are notoriously difficult to read, especially if you have no grounding in the basics of philosophical thought.

03:09 / 22.02.05

I get more and more into the works of d/g everyday. I also tend to think they are closer to an operative Foucault than in the Derrida vein, though there are some interesting colorations to be made with Baudrillard, and the writing style is at points similar. Deleuze’s book on Nietzsche is amazing, one of the best treatments ever IMO. As to where to start, “What is Philosophy?” is fairly straightforward, though I think both volumes of “Capitalism and Schizophrenia” are amazing (and that is where I started), “1000 Plateaus” is just one of those books to have on hand to read when one has a moment.

There are a ton of implications that come from D/G, many of them really not explored in the realms of Philosophy/Academy/Cultural Studies, many commentators satisfy themselves with sounding like D/G rather than working from their insights in a critical manner. This is unfortunate, but was also, I think the case with Foucault, Hegel, etc. It is the plague of the –ians that follow any particularly pivotal thinker. I really wish I had read D/G prior to doing my Masters in Philosophy; I think that my Foucault based analysis would have had a much more productive axis to it.

I love the idea of a D/G reading group, especially if it were to start in mid/late May.

13:35 / 22.02.05

I'd echo Bossoboy's comments. Personally, I don't think I could read Delueze and Guattari, because I don't have the bacground of reading in reading heavyweight, primary source texts.

Also (like a lot of magickal texts) they aren't so much people that you "read" as in blaze through on the tube, they strike me more as texts that you live with - in that you read and re-read them continously (one guy I met had been reading A Thousand Plateaus continously for four years, and may well still be doing so for all I know) - and I think this kind of intellectual enterprise only comes into it's own when it's done in support of your own thinking and theorising - by which I mean, most of the people I know who read this sort of thing are doing it in support of PhD studies or something similar. Anyone care to disagree? Is A Thousand Plateaus for the "layman"?

05:08 / 24.02.05

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned Deleuze's Negotiations, which seems to me the best and most obvious place to start - it's a collection of pretty accessible essays and interviews, including 'Letter to a harsh critic' which is probably the single best introduction to Deleuze's thought. It should also set you up to figure out which lines of his work you're most interested in following up.

21:49 / 24.02.05

I would add "Desert Islands" along with "Negotiations" as a set of shorter texts that are fairly (relatively) accessible...

sdv (non-human)

20:46 / 27.02.05

Just passing through the list and wondering what had been said and then read " Is A Thousand Plateaus for the "layman"?" Well of course it is precisely philosophy for the non-philosopher so I'd recommend that you just read it. Open the text and one word, one sentence and one thought at a time... Treat it as a hypertext but not as D&G suggest ('in any order') which is a disastrous apprach - when you come across a reference that looks interesting take note and follow the link.

but remember join the list already mentioned -

02:50 / 02.03.05

Well okay, sure, but it's philosophy for the nonphilosopher who happens to have an extensive philosophical vocabulary and tons of patience for decrypting complex argumentative styles. Surely recommending ATP as a beginners' text to anyone outside the academy is only going to lose you friends in the long run?

Tryphena Absent

16:01 / 02.03.05

Which suggests that you simply have to be versed in reading rather than versed in philosophy. Most philosophical terms aren't purely philosophical... if you're a language or classics student than you can probably read the text. It depends on your level of education.

sdv (non-human)

21:06 / 08.03.05

Dread

I don't know how to reply to your note - you may be right and works of Deleuze are merely unreadable these days outside of the academy - but then back in 1848 when workers were reading the pamphlets of uncle Karl I imagine that it might have been possible to say the same. Which is why I don't believe this is so - rather the opposite in fact - on my shelf there is a book by J.Rose called 'The Intellectual life of the British Working Classes' on the covers are pictures of early 20th C working men reading pamphlets and books in a working men's library... Are you going to suggest that those who were denied a right to an academic education can't read and educate themselves ?

Either way - all an academic education does is quicken the process - and philosophy is really meant for those who love...

06:53 / 09.03.05

sdv, you seem to be leaving reality at the door. Yes, I'm sure some working class men C1900 did read Marx, but that doesn't change the fact that philosophical works can be very challenging. Christ, I did a philosophy degree and I struggled to understand texts right the way through, as did almost all of my classmates. The point is, we were better placed than most to understand what we were reading but we still had to make a real effort.

The Prince of All Lies

14:00 / 09.03.05

I've read the first parts of What is Philosophy, and found it pretty hard. I got the main idea, but I needed some help interpreting some of the more abstract stuff (the different planes, specifically)

I found the Anti-Oedipus easier to read, and at the same time more challenging. I started by reading the last part, couldn't understand anything, then read part 1 and 2, and got a much better grasp of some of that stuff. But since I only study philosophy as a hobby (though I'll be studying Philosophy this year, due in no small part to D&G's and Foucault's work) I found some of the concepts rather obscure. They never explain some of them, you have to guess what they mean from the context if you don't know much about philosophy, art and psychology.

What I'd suggest is reading their books and making little side notes. My Anti-Oedipus looks like a scrap book, it's full of notes and diagrams in lots of colors. I found that method really useful. You have to think of their books as toolboxes, like Foucault said of his own work.

Tryphena Absent

16:01 / 09.03.05

The point is, we were better placed than most to understand what we were reading but we still had to make a real effort.

You say that but I sometimes wonder if it's not just that most undergraduates are just too young to be able to take the language apart. The vast amount of your reading at that age tends to be children's fiction and literature. The older you get, the more non-fiction you read, the more reference you have naturally and people do tend to hold on to concepts even while forgetting specific meanings.

People doing a BA or Bsc in philosophy are taught that they have to slave over every word but if you're not writing an essay on it... I think it's easier to read philosophy outside of that environment. I don't think you're better placed than most (I did a philosophy BA).

16:48 / 09.03.05

To be fair, Nina, the majority of people on my degree were 21+ (and in many cases ++ , some were even +++). Maybe we were all thickies.

Point taken about the pressure factor, but I can't help feeling that the studying philosophy can afford the student useful tools when it comes to interpreting philosophical texts.

03:08 / 10.03.05

sdv - i'm not trying to be facetious, but do you really think the pamphlet sized (for example) Communist Manifesto, which i read in high school without any serious difficulty, is comparable to the 500 page (ish?) ATP, densely written with many key words clocking in over half a dozen syllables? the texts are difficult! i don't see what makes this a controversial claim.

if somebody asks for an introduction, generally they mean something they can read without specialised knowledge, written so the interested general reader can understand it. of deleuze's books, i really think negotiations is easily the best fit, with dialogues coming second (by some distance) and everything else well behind.

10:25 / 10.03.05

This whole thread is quite hard to read and understand if you know little or nothing of philosophy and philosophical terms, so I would imagine the texts referenced here might severely bend a person's brain.

I don't want to derail this thread but since it appears to be morphing slightly into a debate about the best way to approach philosophy if one is new to it, I feel fairly safe in asking this: Which books would you all recommend in a 'start at the very beginning' kind of way? And I mean very beginning.

15:33 / 10.03.05

Well, in my case a beginner's overview worked pretty well - there's a bunch of 'em. Run a search on Amazon.

Then, once you've found a philosopher you like, you could go the beginners route again and get your hands on a really accessible secondary text (in fact, the Beginners(tm) line springs to mind here).

Next comes the primary text, but fear not, by this time you'll have a context within which to interpret the philosophers' cryptic blatherings. And remember, there are always those secondary texts to help you as you go along - this time, however, you'll probably want something a little more sophisticated to hand.

I think there's something to be said for just diving into the primary source material - it allows you to get really intimate with the text and prevents preconceptions - but, be warned, you'll have to stick with it for the long haul to really get any benefit. Of course, that is part of the fun.

22:54 / 10.03.05

There are also many beginners books on Hypnotism and How to draw Manga, but not all of them are good. In fact some of them are absolutely dire.

Is there an author in particular I should look for, or even just a publisher?

06:19 / 11.03.05

received an email from amazon re: a new book on deleuze. don't know what it's like, but given the blurb it sounds like it may be a good intro for those with 'lith related interests...

Gilles Deleuze : A General Introduction
by Todd May

"Other books have tried to explain Gilles Deleuze (1925-1995), one of the twentieth century's most important and elusive thinkers, in general terms. However, Todd May organizes his introduction around a central question at the heart of Deleuze's philosophy: How might we live? He demonstrates how Deleuze offers a view of the cosmos as a living entity that provides ways of conducting our lives that we may not have even dreamed of."

11:02 / 11.03.05

Is there an author in particular I should look for, or even just a publisher?

olulabelle, I think that when Boboss referred to Beginners(tm) books he meant ones like this (correct me if I'm wrong Boboss) which I could also recommend -generally anything in that line is going to be quite a thorough introduction and provide some context for the thought as well. If you already know of a philospher whose work you want to read, the Very Short Introductions are good, and would probably be useful in pointing you to areas of hir work, or areas of an individual text, that you might want to read.

I'd also recommend, if you're reading philosophy from an era you don't know much about, reading some kind of history of the time -that sometimes clarifies what the writer might be talking about. I might just be saying that because I did political philosophy at uni however, and if you don't want to read from that kind of angle the history may be less important, or you might get enough context from a good introduction to the primary text.

16:42 / 11.03.05

I think that when Boboss referred to Beginners(tm) books he meant ones like this

Them's the ones.

Foust is SO authentic

23:30 / 23.03.05

Gilles Deleuze : A General Introduction
by Todd May

I'm reading this right now. Before this, I had glanced at a few of his books in the library, and was totally intimidated by the vocabulary.

May's book, I think, could be read by a layman. Meaning me. I'm getting at least a superficial grasp on the concepts; I'll decide once I'm finished if I actually want to move on to a primary text.

To add, I listened to an introductory lecture on Delueze today given by my courses' TA. I came away with the impression that what Delueze wants is for us to encounter our bodies, to experience how they are creating us. But then, Delueze killed himself. So apparently there's a limit to how much we should indulge our bodies.

02:55 / 24.03.05

Sheesh, thanks for all the help. Sorry, I forgot about this thread for a while, I'll get something suggested here anyway and post back.

19:56 / 26.03.05

for my part i would suggest "The Continental Aesthetics Reader" edited by Clive Cazuaux. It has excerpts and texts from a great many thinkers, starting with Kant and working its way through the different movements to Deleuze and Guattari. there are at least 35 different philosophers covered with a short introduction for each of them that puts their work in context and highlights their main focus. I use this book continuously in my own studies and i believe that a layman with a bit of passion could nivigate it quite successfully.

nyarlathotep's shoe horn

19:19 / 27.03.05

the difficulty in gaining a clue as to what D&G were writing about is that most of us are reading it in translation (I'm guessing - maybe some of us are reading & understanding the French)...

I've read bits of ATP in English, and found its style to be reminiscent of Marshall McLuhan - somewhere between a scrying-text and an inside joke. Not to undermine any of the content, however, it feels like there's a deliberate use of obscure phraseology.

pablo

maybe it's the translation...

sdv (non-human)

13:21 / 06.04.05

sorry been away so couldn't respond before... hope it's not to late.

Try reading the 1844 manuscripts, Grundisse and then ask yourself why anyone might imagine that D&G's text's are any more difficult to understand than that.

It could be said to be just as important to understand the technicalities of the science political economy to understand Marx as it is to have a grasp of Leroi-Gourhan and Palentological Archeology to understand D&G's positions. Of course I don't believe this is true - actually I still maintain that a reasonably literate 21st C person can read D&G more easily than say - Dickens, Bergson or Tolstoy. And more to the point it is becoming easier, let me demonstrate when I first read Deleuze's Difference and Repetition absolutely nobody had a clue what the concept 'virtual' referred to - whereas almost anybody on this list would understand it now.

The Todd May book does look quite good (I looked at it in Foyle's yesterday) - but the general rule I tend to recommend is "...source texts are easier to read and comprehend than secondary texts..."

and join a reading group/list...

sdv

10:12 / 07.04.05

Er, so Being and Time is easier to understand than a beginner's guide to Heidegger?

Maybe for you.

Tryphena Absent

10:23 / 07.04.05

Hey, you're assuming that the author has a clue about it either, which you just can't tell when you pick up a book before reading the source text. The only guide to a philosopher that ever really worked for me was a step by step description of Kant. I've read all kinds of work on Derrida- most of it left me more confused than the source text, eventually I just had to ask people what he was talking about- and Quine, Heidegger, Sartre. All explanations do is give you an opinion on the work that actually often turns out to be at odds with the interpretation you put on the text yourself. Especially if it's Walter Benjamin. You have to interpret the guide as well as the source and you know that philosophy is half a language game at the end of the day- after doing a degree, if I judged someone as having half a brain and some time, I'd always tell them to read the source text first. you should never rely on a third person to explain philosophical theory to you.

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