Theoretical Writings

Description

Alain Badiou is arguably the most important and original philosopher working in France today. Swimming against the tide of postmodern orthodoxy, Badiou's thought revitalizes philosophy's perennial attempt to provide a systematic theory of truth. This volume, assembled with the collaboration of the author, presents a comprehensive outline of Badiou's ambitious system. Starting from the controversial assertion that ontology is mathematics, it sets out the theory of the emergence of truths from the singular relationship between a subject and an event. Also included is a substantial excerpt from Badiou's forthcoming work on the logics of appearance and the concept of world, presented here in advance of its French publication. Ranging from startling re-readings of canonical figures (Spinoza, Kant and Hegel) to decisive engagements with poetry, psychoanalysis and radical politics, "Theoretical Writings" is an introduction to one of the great thinkers of time.

Ray Brassier is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon. Alain Badiou is a world-renowned French philosopher, formerly chair of the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, France, and founder of the faculty of Philosophy at the University of Paris VIII with Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault, and Jean-Francois Lyotard. Badiou has authored multiple major works of philosophy, many of which have been published in English by Bloomsbury, including Being and Event (2005), Logics of Worlds (2009), and The Immanence of Truths (forthcoming, 2021). Alberto Toscano is Lecturer in Sociology at Goldsmiths College, University of London. He is the editor and translator, with Ray Brassier, of Alain Badiou's Theoretical Writings (London: Continuum, 2004).

"Theoretical Writings provides an overview of Badiou's major concepts, including being, the event and truth, and draws on unpublished manuscripts...What makes Badiou a challenging figure is his insistence on the irreducible multiplicity of truths, encountered between philosophy, and science, art, politics and love." -De Philosophia, 2004