{"product_id":"discourse-figure-jean-franzois-lyotard-9780816645664","title":"Discourse, Figure","description":"\u003cb\u003eLyotard's earliest major work, available in English for the first time​ \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eChoice\u003c\/i\u003e Outstanding Academic Title \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Jean-François Lyotard is recognized as one of the most significant French philosophers of the twentieth century. Although nearly all of his major writing has been translated into English, one important work has until now been unavailable. \u003ci\u003eDiscourse, Figure\u003c\/i\u003e is Lyotard's thesis. Provoked in part by Lacan's influential seminars in Paris, \u003ci\u003eDiscourse, Figure\u003c\/i\u003e distinguishes between the meaningfulness of linguistic signs and the meaningfulness of plastic arts such as painting and sculpture. Lyotard argues that because rational thought is discursive and works of art are inherently opaque signs, certain aspects of artistic meaning such as symbols and the pictorial richness of painting will always be beyond reason's grasp. A wide-ranging and highly unusual work, \u003ci\u003eDiscourse, Figure\u003c\/i\u003e proceeds from an attentive consideration of the phenomenology of experience to an ambitious meditation on the psychoanalytic account of the subject of experience, structured by the confrontation between phenomenology and psychoanalysis as contending frames within which to think the materialism of consciousness. In addition to prefiguring many of Lyotard's later concerns, \u003ci\u003eDiscourse, Figure\u003c\/i\u003e captures Lyotard's passionate engagement with topics beyond phenomenology and psychoanalysis to structuralism, semiotics, poetry, art, and the philosophy of language.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Jean-François Lyotard\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0816645663\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780816645664\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University of Minnesota Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 10\/22\/2019\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 544\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.65lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.90h x 5.90w x 1.50d","brand":"Jean-François Lyotard","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":49082571620607,"sku":"9780816645664","price":30.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/discourse-figure-jean-franzois-lyotard-9780816645664","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}