DOI: 10.4231/fv35-3b91
title: Leibniz and the Baroque, Lecture 13, 17 March1987

description: &lt;p&gt;A series of lectures given by French philosopher Gilles Deleuze at the University of Paris 8. This thirteenth lecture is organized within a 20-lecture seminar that Deleuze taught between October 1986 and June 1987, presented on March 17, 1987.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Having devoted the previous session to the Leibniz-Whitehead connection in the presence of Isabelle Stengers, Deleuze continues this &ldquo;confrontation&rdquo;, opening with Whitehead&rsquo;s affirmation &ldquo;everything is event&rdquo; and immediately noting critical misconceptions about Leibniz as well as Whitehead. Deleuze proposes to discern what the conditions of the event&rsquo;s emergence are, i.e., the genesis of the actual occasion, which he developed in the previous session in four moments. Leibniz calls the event&rsquo;s element the &ldquo;monad&rdquo;, a prehension of the world, with five aspects, and Deleuze refers to the neo-Platonic tradition in this regard, notably Plotinus&rsquo;s third &lt;em&gt;Ennead&lt;/em&gt;, where everything rejoices in itself by contemplating and thereby each thing fulfills itself, or in Leibniz&rsquo;s terms, each thing is unconscious contemplation of its conditions of existence, i.e., of its requisites, e.g., the contemplative nature of the cow. For Deleuze, the aspect of auto-contemplation or self-enjoyment corresponds to Samuel Butler&rsquo;s term &ldquo;habitus&rdquo;, and this &ldquo;enjoyment&rdquo;, says Deleuze, is living itself, a small confidence of endurance in contrast to the agony interrupting &ldquo;self-enjoyment&rdquo;. Deleuze proposes that each of the organs prehends other prehensions to infinity, i.e., &ldquo;feeling&rdquo; as the private form of prehension, the calm confidence that this continues, but not forever, the individual as a conglomerate of prehending subject, a nexus or prehensions all having some &ldquo;self-enjoyment&rdquo;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This dataset includes one .mp3 audio file of the original recorded lecture and the complete French transcription and English translation in odt format.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;--&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Les S&eacute;minaires de Deleuze sont une collection d&#39;enregistrements audio, de transcriptions et de traductions en anglais et de documents compl&eacute;mentaires des conf&eacute;rences que le philosophe fran&ccedil;ais Gilles Deleuze a donn&eacute; lors de sa carri&egrave;re &agrave; l&#39;Universit&eacute; de Paris 8.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Apr&egrave;s avoir consacr&eacute; la s&eacute;ance pr&eacute;c&eacute;dente &agrave; la connexion Leibniz-Whitehead en pr&eacute;sence d&rsquo;Isabelle Stengers, Deleuze poursuit cette &laquo; confrontation &raquo;, en commen&ccedil;ant par l&rsquo;affirmation de Whitehead &laquo; tout est &eacute;v&eacute;nement &raquo; et en relevant imm&eacute;diatement les malentendus critiques &agrave; l&rsquo;&eacute;gard de Leibniz comme de Whitehead. Deleuze se r&eacute;f&egrave;re &agrave; cet &eacute;gard &agrave; la tradition n&eacute;oplatonicienne, notamment &agrave; la troisi&egrave;me Enn&eacute;ade de Plotin, o&ugrave; tout se r&eacute;jouit de soi en contemplant, et par-l&agrave;, chaque chose se r&eacute;alise. Pour Deleuze, l&rsquo;aspect de l&rsquo;auto-contemplation ou de la &laquo; self-enjoyment &raquo; correspond au terme d&rsquo;&laquo; habitus &raquo; de Samuel Butler, et cette &laquo; enjoyment &raquo;, dit Deleuze, c&rsquo;est vivre lui-m&ecirc;me. Deleuze propose que chacun des organes &laquo; pr&eacute;hende &raquo; d&rsquo;autres pr&eacute;hensions &agrave; l&rsquo;infini, c&rsquo;est-&agrave;-dire le &laquo; feeling &raquo; comme forme priv&eacute;e de pr&eacute;hension, la confiance tranquille que cela continue, mais pas &eacute;ternellement, l&rsquo;individu comme un conglom&eacute;rat de sujets &laquo; pr&eacute;hendents &raquo;, un nexus de pr&eacute;hensions ayant toutes une certaine &laquo; self-enjoyment &raquo;.&lt;/p&gt;
description: : Seminar of 20 sessions given by French philosopher Gilles Deleuze at Paris 8-St. Denis University, October 28, 1986, to June 2, 1987, Deleuze’s final seminar in his career. This thirteenth session was presented on March 17, 1987.