Author Archives: stuartelden

Emily Eakin, The Frenchmen or, my Life in Theory – Penguin, July 2025

Posted on July 29, 2026 by stuartelden

Emily Eakin, The Frenchmen or, my Life in Theory – Penguin, July 2025 Review in The New York Times; feature in The New Yorker (requires subscription). Thanks to dmf and Alin Constantin for the alert. Update: there is also a … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Anthony Iles and Mattin eds., Abolishing Capitalist Totality – Minor Compositions, 2026

Posted on July 28, 2026 by stuartelden

Anthony Iles and Mattin eds., Abolishing Capitalist Totality – Minor Compositions, 2026 When capitalism feels inescapable, theory becomes a weapon to challenge fatalistic totalities. This book explores the limits of the colonization of everyday life by economic logic gone mad. … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Francis Dupuis-Déri – Killer Althusser: The Banality of Men – trans. Mélissa Bull, Between the Lines, June 2025

Posted on July 28, 2026 by stuartelden

Francis Dupuis-Déri – Killer Althusser: The Banality of Men – trans. Mélissa Bull, Between the Lines, June 2025 On November 16, 1980, the Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser strangled his wife in their Parisian apartment, in a period when she was … Continue reading →

Posted in Hélène Legotien, Louis Althusser | Leave a comment

Books received (2) – Bloch, Wolff, Butler, Sloterdijk, Erdur, Klein-Gousseff, Ginzburg

Posted on July 27, 2026 by stuartelden

Two recent editions of texts by Marc Bloch, Étienne Wolff’s Science des monstres, two recent books by Judith Butler, Who’s Afraid of Gender? and What World is This? A Pandemic Phenomenology, Peter Sloterdijk’s The Continent without Qualities: Bookmarks in the … Continue reading →

Posted in Étienne Wolff, Carlo Ginzburg, Georges Bataille, Georges Canguilhem, Judith Butler, Marc Bloch, Michel Foucault, teaching | 3 Comments

Books received (1) – Bloch, Derrida, Patchin, Neale, Caló & Enes Pereira, Braudel

Posted on July 27, 2026 by stuartelden

Older books by Bloch and Braudel, bought second-hand, a reedition of three important texts by Derrida,  Force de loi, Voyous, Fichus, and the recent La Chose Séminaire (1975-1977) Suivi de la 6e séance de Donner le temps II, Paige Marie Patchin, … Continue reading →

Posted in Felix Guattari, Fernand Braudel, Marc Bloch, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, Louis Renou and a 1940 arrest by the Germans

Posted on July 26, 2026 by stuartelden

I’ve written about Marie-Louise Sjoestedt (1900-1940), an important scholar of Celtic languages and mythology, briefly before in this series. From various accounts, there are two pieces of information about her. If both are true, then Renou (1896-1966) was arrested in 1940. But I’ve … Continue reading →

Posted in Antoine Meillet, Emile Benveniste, Georges Dumézil, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Carlo Ginzburg and Adriano Prosperi, Puzzles: A Seminar on the ‘Benefit of Christ’ – trans. Thomas Haskell Simpson, Seagull, March 2026

Posted on July 25, 2026 by stuartelden

Carlo Ginzburg and Adriano Prosperi, Puzzles: A Seminar on the ‘Benefit of Christ’ – trans. Thomas Haskell Simpson, Seagull, March 2026 I’ve previously shared some of the many tributes to Ginzburg, who died in June. I hadn’t seen that this … Continue reading →

Posted in Adriano Prosperi, Carlo Ginzburg, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Elvan Cobb, Infrastructured Landscapes: Spatial Histories of Early Ottoman Railways – Brill, July 2026

Posted on July 25, 2026 by stuartelden

Elvan Cobb, Infrastructured Landscapes: Spatial Histories of Early Ottoman Railways – Brill, July 2026 In Infrastructured Landscapes, Elvan Cobb reveals how the arrival of railways originating from the eastern Mediterranean port city of Izmir reshaped the very fabric of space and … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Cary Wolfe, Jagged Ontologies – University of Minnesota Press, July 2026

Posted on July 24, 2026 by stuartelden

Cary Wolfe, Jagged Ontologies – University of Minnesota Press, July 2026 Rethinking life, justice, and the biosphere through the sharp edges of jagged ontology In this groundbreaking book, Cary Wolfe dismantles some of the most entrenched assumptions in contemporary interdisciplinary … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

David Armitage, Teresa M. Bejan, and Felix Waldmann eds. The Political Thought of John Locke: New Perspectives – Oxford University Press, July 2026

Posted on July 23, 2026 by stuartelden

David Armitage, Teresa M. Bejan, and Felix Waldmann eds. The Political Thought of John Locke: New Perspectives – Oxford University Press, July 2026 The Political Thought of John Locke: New Perspectives offers the most comprehensive collective overview of Locke’s political thought … Continue reading →

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