Rhizosphere: Gilles Deleuze and the 'Minor' American Writing of William James, W.E.B. Du Bois, Gertrude Stein, Jean Toomer, and William Falkner

by Mary Zamberlin

Overview

This book explores the significant intellectual impact the philosopher Jean Wahl had on the directions Gilles Deleuze took as a philosopher and writer of a philosophy of experimentation. The study of this influence also brings to light the significance of Deleuze's emphasis on la pragmatique, inspired by Wahl's writings and teachings and his fascination with American pluralism and pragmatism, particularly that of William James. This book also attempts to put Deleuze's theories into action, to write in a deleuzian way about American 'minor' literature and thought which Deleuze deemed 'superior.' This text inherently challenges and potentially provides an alternative way of reading/writing to standard critical approaches which Deleuze tells us necessarily reduce and distort a 'minor' work's most lively, subtle and micro-politically efficient elements as they abort them from their 'minoritarian' fields of meaning to coerce them into already existing, standard and standardizing concepts that belong to and reinforce the 'Major Order's' organizational grid.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781138813908
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	07/03/2014
Series:	Literary Criticism and Cultural Theory
Pages:	160
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Mary Zamberlin teaches French language and literature in Mercer Island, Washington. In spring of 2004 she participated in the International Colloquium on Gilles Deleuze "Experimenting With Intensities" at Trent University where she presented The Relations Between: Jean Wahl, Gilles Deleuze and American Pragmatism.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction: Between Gilles Deleuze and William James: Rhizomatics AND Pragmatics 2. France's 'Two Most Important Philosophers': Jean Wahl and Jean Paul Sartre 3. Disseminating the 'Eaches': W.E.B. Du Bois's Souls and the Micro-Politics of Sound 4. Traitors not Cheaters: Le Devenir Imperceptible in the Writings of Gertrude Stein, Jean Toomer and William Faulkner Conclusion