Deleuze, Cinema and the Thought of the World - Paperback

by Allan James Thomas (Author)

Why does Gilles Deleuze write about the cinema to address specific philosophical problems? Deleuze turns to the cinema precisely because its formal resources enable it to 'think' the relation between movement and duration in ways that philosophy cannot. Allan James Thomas unpacks the nature of the philosophical problems that Deleuze turns to the cinema to resolve and shows how resources of the cinema enable him to do so where philosophy alone cannot. He offers new insights into the conceptual underpinnings both of the Cinema books themselves and of the trajectory of Deleuzian philosophy.

Back Jacket

'Allen James Thomas' superb book is a wonderfully detailed analysis of Deleuze's work on the cinema, but it is also a profound work of philosophy. For Deleuze, great filmmakers are also great thinkers who happen to think in terms of images rather than concepts. By reading Deleuze through the lens of writers as diverse as Bergson, Blanchot, Badiou, and Barradori, Thomas's book is a wide-ranging exploration of the Deleuzian thesis that cinema must be understood, above all, as an act of thinking.' Daniel W. Smith, Purdue University Why does Gilles Deleuze write about the cinema as a philosopher? Despite their title, Gilles Deleuze's Cinema books are not 'about' the cinema: they are works of philosophy first and foremost, even if this has yet to be fully recognised. Deleuze turns to the cinema in order to address specific philosophical problems, precisely because the formal resources of the cinema enable it to 'think' the relation between movement and duration in ways that philosophy cannot. Allan James Thomas unpacks the nature of the philosophical problems that Deleuze turns to the cinema to resolve, and shows both how and why the resources of the cinema enable him to do so where philosophy alone cannot. Thomas offers new insights into the conceptual underpinnings both of the Cinema books themselves and of the trajectory of Deleuzian philosophy as a whole. Allan James Thomas is Lecturer in the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University, Australia Cover image: Trees in the morning mist, 2009 (c) Yvan Travert/akg-images Cover design: [EUP logo] edinburghuniversitypress.com ISBN 978-1-4744-3279-5 Barcode

Author Biography

Allan James Thomas is Lecturer in the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University.