Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Since its publication in 1968, Difference and Repetition , an exposition of the critique of identity, has come to be considered a contemporary classic in philosophy and one of Gilles Deleuze's most important works. The text follows the development of two central concepts, those of pure difference and complex repetition. It shows how the two concepts are related, difference implying divergence and decentring, repetition being associated with displacement and disguising. The work moves deftly between Hegel, Kierkegaard, Freud, Althusser and Nietzsche to establish a fundamental critique of Western metaphysics, and has been a central text in initiating the shift in French thought - away from Hegel and Marx, towards Nietzsche and Freud.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• Translator's Preface
• Preface to the English Edition
• Preface
• Introduction: Repetition and Difference
• Chapter I Difference in Itself
• Chapter II Repetition for Itself
• Chapter III The Image of Thought
• Chapter IV Ideas and the Synthesis of Difference
• Chapter V Asymmetrical Synthesis of the Sensible
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

This is a long-overdue, and skillful, translation of one of Deleuze's most important and original works, which was first published in 1968. It occupies an important place in Deleuze's oeuvre as the first text, following a series of historical commentaries, in which he philosophizes on his own behalf. It occupies an equally important place in the evolution of French philosophy in the 20th century, as it articulates a profound critique of the philosophy of representation while constructing a metaphysics of difference freed from subordination to a logic of identity. While charting the development through the history of philosophy of the concepts "pure difference" and "complex repetition," Deleuze proposes a new image of thought, which readers familiar with his later works will recognize. A difficult and challenging text that has done as much as any to initiate the philosophy of difference that characterizes much recent French thought, this book is one of the classics of recent European philosophy. It belongs in any library with holdings in philosophy. Upper-division undergraduate; graduate; faculty. A. D. Schrift; Grinnell College