- Hardcover: 288 pages
- Publisher: Verso Press USA (Oct 1 1997)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1859848575
- ISBN-13: 978-1859848579
- Product Dimensions: 24.3 x 16.2 x 2.4 cm
- Shipping Weight: 544 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Details |
Product Description
Review
The Giant of Ljubljana provides the best intellectual high since Anti-Oedipus. -- Voice Literary Supplement
Book Description
Zizek returns to untangle a heady mix of fantasy and ideology. With his idiosyncratic blend of ideas from Lacan and Hegel, the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek has emerged as one of the most original thinkers of our time. Never missing an opportunity to recount a revealing anec-dote or joke his writing is as entertaining as it is informative. In his latest book, Zizek approaches another enormous subject with characteristic brio. The current epoch is, he claims, plagued by phantasms. There is an intensifying antagonism between the ever greater abstraction of our lives -- whether in the form of digitalization or market relations and the deluge of pseudo-concrete images which surround us. Traditional critical thought traces the connections between abstract notions and concrete social reality: but today, Zizek suggests, the correct procedure is the inverse -- to work from pseudo-concrete imagery towards the abstract. Ranging in his examples from national differences in toilet design to cybersex, and from intellectuals' responses to the Bosnian war to Robert Schumann's music, Zizek explores the relations between fantasy and ideology, the way in which fantasy animates enjoy-ment while protecting against its excesses, the associations of the notion of fetishism with fantasized seduction, and the ways in which digitalization and cyberspace affect the status of subjectivity. To the already initiated, The Plague of Fantasies will be a welcome reminder of why they enjoy Zizek's writing so much. For new readers, it will be the beginning of a long and meaningful relationship.
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Customer Reviews
Most helpful customer reviews
Lacanian pyschoanalysis applied to politics
Feb 18 2003
Format:Paperback
Zizek's claim to fame is his rapacious wit, keen insights, and his profound, hilarious and shocking use of anecdotes. Here, Zizek focuses on the relation between fantasy and desire, and the latter he sees as rooted fully in the former. Fantasy, he argues, is the foundation for political and social action. As a Marxist, he makes an interesting some interesting arguments along a line that is seemingly contradictory to his ideological convictions employing Lacan heavily but also drawing upon and offering some interesting interpretations of Hegel. He ends the book with insights on how the digitization of our universe--overly fantasized--as alienated us from our corporeality. This he views negatively as a plague--finally suggesting that the task of critical theory is the inverse of the traditional one starting with concrete social reality and then moving to abstract notions. Rather, the pseudo-concrete and virtual which now structure our lives must be debunked. His writing is erratic but intrepid and certainly worth the effort.
Reading Theory Isn't Supposed to Be This Fun, Is It?
Jun 24 1998
Format:Paperback
For those who enjoy the challenge of reading high theory but are put off by the dry, abstract, pretentious ramblings that more often than not constitute theoretical writing, Zizek is the theorist for you. Is there another theorist alive who can on one page explicate the finer points of Lacan, Hegel and Kant, while on the next page tie it all in with the three most popular female pubic hair styles, homosexual ; and subtle distinctions among toilet designs in Germany, France, and the United States? Perhaps. But Zizek makes these seemingly awkward transitions and uncommon examples quite smoothly; the outrageous examples aren't forced, nor are they merely for "shock" value. In short, they work to clarify the difficult concepts he is discussing. Although Zizek is not what I'd call an easy read - not by a long shot - he certainly knows how to make a challenge a bit less stressful and - gasp! - fun. END
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