Georges Bataille

by Paul Hegarty

Published 18 August 2000
Long recognized in France as a central figure in French cultural thought, the range and significance of Batilleā€²s ideas are now being grasped in the English speaking world. His influence on Derrida, Foucault, Kristeva and Baudrillard is now more clearly understood and Bataille has emerged as a front-rank cultural theorist who posed questions and paradoxes that were extraordinarily prescient.

This book offers a comprehensive and detailed presentation and analysis of the full range of his writings - political, philosophical, aesthetic, literary, anthropological and cultural. And tackles his thoughts on waste, sacrifice, death, eroticism, surplus, ecstasy and drunkenness, offering the best available guide to this challenging and utterly unique thinker.