Georges Bataille

In "Georges Bataille", Stuart Kendall offers the first concise introductory critical biography of this pivotal twentieth century French writer, anthropologist and philosopher.

During his lifetime, Bataille was a foil for Surrealism and Existentialism and for the agents of radical politics on both sides of the spectrum, both before and after World War II.

He was instrumental in the emergence of the New French Sociology and his writings in aesthetics and art history presaged the field of visual culture.

After his death in 1962, Bataille exerted arguably the single greatest influence on the post-structuralist revolution in twentieth century thought.

The book vividly brings its subject to life within the personal and political milieu in which he wrote.

Unlike the many critical introductions to Bataille's thought, this book reminds us that Georges Bataille lived and wrote within - though often against - an all-too-human community, a community including Andre Breton and Jean-Paul Sartre, Alexandre Kojeve and Jacques Lacan, Roger Caillois and Michel Leiris, Andre Masson, Colette Peignot, and Maurice Blanchot among many others."Georges Bataille" will appeal to readers in the fields of anthropology and art history, literary studies and poetics, philosophy, economics, sociology and theology; all fields in which Bataille made decisive contributions.