Author Guide · Philosophy
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Michel Foucault once wrote that “one day, perhaps, this century will be called Deleuzian.” Gilles Deleuze (1925–1995) later called the remark a joke meant to make their friends laugh, but the line stuck. A philosophy teacher who spent most of his career at the University of Paris VIII, he wrote studies of Hume, Nietzsche, Spinoza and Proust, a doctoral thesis that tried to put difference before identity, and, with the psychoanalyst Félix Guattari, two books that became shorthand for the thinking that came after May 1968: Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus. In 2007 he was the eleventh most-cited author in English-language humanities publications. This guide covers his 14 key books, in order, and where to begin.
By Lisanne Swart · 14 key books · 1962–1991 · Updated October 2026
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Quick answer
Gilles Deleuze’s best-known books are Anti-Oedipus (1972) and A Thousand Plateaus (1980), both written with Félix Guattari, and his own Difference and Repetition (1968). Start with Spinoza: Practical Philosophy (1970, expanded 1981), a short book that shows his way of thinking at its clearest. Years are those of the first French editions.
Where to Start with Gilles Deleuze
If you want the shortest way in
→ Spinoza: Practical Philosophy (1970) — Spinoza’s ethics of joy and sadness, partly in dictionary form.
If you want his own philosophy
→ Difference and Repetition (1968) — his doctoral thesis and the core of his thought.
If you want the books that made him famous
→ Anti-Oedipus (1972) — the first volume of Capitalism and Schizophrenia.
If you want him on art and film
→ Cinema 1 (1983) — the first of his two books on cinema.
14 Gilles Deleuze Books, in Order
Nietzsche and Philosophy
Nietzsche et la philosophie reads Nietzsche as a systematic philosopher of forces, active and reactive, and sets him against Hegel and the dialectic. It was his first book since Empiricism and Subjectivity, his study of Hume, in 1953. The English translation appeared in 1983.
Proust and Signs
Proust et les signes reads In Search of Lost Time not as a book about memory but as an apprenticeship in signs: of society, of love, of the senses and finally of art. It was translated into English in 1973, the first of his books to appear in English.
Difference and Repetition
Différence et répétition, published by Presses Universitaires de France, was his principal thesis for the doctorat d’État. It argues that philosophy has always subordinated difference to identity, resemblance and opposition, and tries to think difference and repetition in their own right, ending with three “syntheses” of time: habit, memory and the eternal return. The English translation, by Paul Patton, appeared in 1994.
Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza
Spinoza et le problème de l’expression was his secondary, historical thesis, submitted alongside Difference and Repetition. It is a long, technical reading of Spinoza’s Ethics built around the idea of expression: how God, or nature, expresses itself in its attributes and modes. It was translated into English in 1990.
The Logic of Sense
Logique du sens is written as a series of short chapters, called “series”, that move between the Stoics, Lewis Carroll’s Alice books and psychoanalysis to ask how sense and nonsense arise. With Difference and Repetition it was the most influential of his early books. The English translation appeared in 1990.
Spinoza: Practical Philosophy
First published by PUF in 1970 and revised and expanded for Les Éditions de Minuit in 1981 as Spinoza: Philosophie pratique. Deleuze presents Spinoza’s Ethics as an ethics rather than a morality: good and bad are encounters that increase or decrease our power to act, felt as joy and sadness. A long chapter defines Spinoza’s main concepts in dictionary form. Robert Hurley’s English translation was published by City Lights in 1988.
Anti-Oedipus
L’Anti-Œdipe, published by Les Éditions de Minuit, was the first book Deleuze wrote with the psychoanalyst Félix Guattari. It attacks the Oedipus complex at the centre of psychoanalysis and treats desire as productive rather than as lack, tied directly to the economy and society. It was received as a theory of the spirit of May 1968. The English translation, by Robert Hurley, Mark Seem and Helen R. Lane, appeared in 1977.
Kafka
Kafka: Pour une littérature mineure, the second book with Guattari, reads Kafka as the writer of a “minor literature”: one written by a minority inside a major language, as Kafka, a Jew in Prague, wrote in German. It was translated into English in 1986.
A Thousand Plateaus
Mille Plateaux, the second volume of Capitalism and Schizophrenia, is built from fifteen “plateaus”, each headed by a date, on subjects from geology and language to music, the state and the nomadic “war machine”. Its introduction, “Rhizome”, first published separately in 1976, describes a way of thinking without roots or hierarchy. Brian Massumi’s English translation appeared in 1987.
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon: Logique de la sensation is a study of the paintings of Francis Bacon: the isolated figures, the distorted bodies and how painting can act directly on the nervous system rather than tell a story. The English translation, by Daniel W. Smith, appeared in 2003.
Cinema 1
Cinéma 1: L’image-mouvement draws on Henri Bergson to classify the images of classical cinema, from Griffith and Eisenstein to the Western and the action film, where images are linked through movement and action. It was translated into English in 1986.
Cinema 2
Cinéma 2: L’image-temps follows the cinema of the post-war period, from Italian neorealism to the French New Wave, where time no longer depends on action and comes to the surface of the image itself. It was translated into English in 1989.
Foucault
Written two years after Michel Foucault’s death in 1984, the book reads his friend’s work as a whole, from knowledge to power to the late turn towards the self. It was translated into English in 1988.
What Is Philosophy?
Qu’est-ce que la philosophie?, the last book with Guattari, defines philosophy as the creation of concepts and sets it beside science and art as three different ways of thinking. The English translation, by Hugh Tomlinson and Graham Burchell, appeared in 1994.
In What Order to Read Gilles Deleuze
Deleuze’s books fall into three groups: studies of other thinkers and writers (Hume, Nietzsche, Bergson, Spinoza, Proust, Kafka, Foucault), the books of his own philosophy (Difference and Repetition and The Logic of Sense), and the four books with Guattari. The studies are the easiest way in, because the concepts he later uses for himself appear there first, attached to a familiar name.
Read Anti-Oedipus before A Thousand Plateaus, but do not expect a sequel: the second volume is looser, and its authors say its plateaus can be read in any order. Difference and Repetition is the hardest of all; Deleuze himself wrote in its preface that its conclusions should be read at the outset.
A reading path
1. Spinoza: Practical Philosophy (1970)
2. Nietzsche and Philosophy (1962)
3. Anti-Oedipus (1972)
4. A Thousand Plateaus (1980)
5. Difference and Repetition (1968)
Everything Else Gilles Deleuze Published
Beyond the 14 key books: 10 more, grouped by kind.
Open a group with the + to see every book in it.
Studies of philosophers and writers
5
5 books · 1953–1988
- 1953Empiricism and Subjectivityhis first book, on Hume; in English 1991
- 1963Kant’s Critical Philosophya short study of Kant’s three critiques; in English 1983
- 1966Bergsonismon Henri Bergson; in English 1988
- 1967Masochism: Coldness and Crueltyan essay on Leopold von Sacher-Masoch; in English 1989
- 1988The Fold: Leibniz and the Baroqueon Leibniz and baroque art; in English 1993
Conversations, essays and collections
5
5 books · 1977–2004
- 1977Dialogueswith Claire Parnet; in English as Dialogues II, 1987
- 1990Negotiationsinterviews and short texts, 1972–1990; in English 1995
- 1993Essays Critical and Clinicalessays on literature; in English 1997
- 2002Desert Islands and Other Textstexts from 1953–1974, published posthumously
- 2004Two Regimes of Madnesstexts from 1975–1995, published posthumously
The years · 1925–1995
Quick facts about Gilles Deleuze
- Known for
- Gilles Deleuze is known for a philosophy of difference and becoming, and for the books with Félix Guattari that turned concepts such as the rhizome and desiring-production into common currency in the humanities.
- 1925
- Born in Paris
- 1972
- Anti-Oedipus, with Guattari
- 1995
- Dies in Paris, aged 70
- Born
- 18 January 1925, Paris, France
- Died
- 4 November 1995, Paris, aged 70
- Education
- The Sorbonne from 1944; agrégation in philosophy, 1948
- Taught
- Lycées until 1957; University of Lyon, 1964–1969; University of Paris VIII, 1969–1987
- Married
- Denise Paul “Fanny” Grandjouan, in 1956; two children
- Collaborator
- The psychoanalyst Félix Guattari, on four books from 1972 to 1991
The red mark is 1972: Anti-Oedipus, the first book he wrote with Félix Guattari.
How Gilles Deleuze Writes: Philosophy as the Creation of Concepts
Deleuze spent the first half of his career writing about other philosophers, but never as a neutral commentator. He described his method, in a deliberately shocking image, as taking an author from behind and giving him a child that would be recognisably his, yet monstrous and different. His Nietzsche, his Bergson and above all his Spinoza are read so that they say something new, which is why those books are also the best introduction to his own ideas.
His own books are built from invented or reworked concepts rather than arguments laid out step by step: difference without a concept, the virtual, the body without organs, the rhizome, deterritorialisation. In What Is Philosophy? he and Guattari made this the definition of the subject: philosophy is the creation of concepts. The writing is dense and often technical, and critics have attacked it for that; Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont accused him of misusing mathematical and scientific terms.
The books with Guattari are faster and more political, written in a voice that belongs to neither of them alone. They range widely, from psychoanalysis and capitalism to Kafka, birdsong and nomads, and borrow examples from literature, film and painting as freely as from philosophy. For the thinker behind his ethics, see the books of Baruch Spinoza; for his friend and contemporary, see the books of Michel Foucault.
Watch
Gilles Deleuze Lecturing at Vincennes, 1980
Gilles Deleuze gives a lecture at the Université Paris 8 (Vincennes-Saint-Denis) on 27 May 1980, the first session of Anti-Œdipe et autres réflexions; a transcription is linked on webdeleuze.com. In French. From the official Webdeleuze channel.
Frequently asked questions about Gilles Deleuze’s books
How many books has Gilles Deleuze written?
More than twenty, four of them with Félix Guattari, and two further collections of texts published after his death. Fourteen are the key books on this page, from Nietzsche and Philosophy (1962) to What Is Philosophy? (1991).
What are Gilles Deleuze’s books in order?
Nietzsche and Philosophy (1962), Proust and Signs (1964), Difference and Repetition (1968), Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza (1968), The Logic of Sense (1969), Spinoza: Practical Philosophy (1970), Anti-Oedipus (1972), Kafka (1975), A Thousand Plateaus (1980), Francis Bacon (1981), Cinema 1 (1983), Cinema 2 (1985), Foucault (1986) and What Is Philosophy? (1991). Years are those of the first French editions.
Where should I start with Gilles Deleuze?
Spinoza: Practical Philosophy. It is short, it explains the ethics of joy and sadness that runs through all his work, and a long chapter defines Spinoza’s concepts in dictionary form. Nietzsche and Philosophy is a good second step before the books with Guattari.
What is Gilles Deleuze’s most famous book?
Anti-Oedipus (1972), written with Félix Guattari, made him famous and was read as a theory of May 1968; A Thousand Plateaus (1980) is probably the more influential today. Of the books he wrote alone, Difference and Repetition (1968) is the most important.
In what order should I read Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus?
They are the two volumes of Capitalism and Schizophrenia, so Anti-Oedipus (1972) comes first. A Thousand Plateaus (1980) is not a straight continuation, though: its fifteen plateaus can be read in any order, and many readers start with the introduction, “Rhizome”.
Who was Félix Guattari?
A French psychoanalyst and political activist who worked with Deleuze on four books: Anti-Oedipus (1972), Kafka (1975), A Thousand Plateaus (1980) and What Is Philosophy? (1991).
What is L’Abécédaire de Gilles Deleuze?
An eight-hour series of interviews between Deleuze and Claire Parnet, organised by the letters of the alphabet. It was broadcast on the French-German channel Arte in 1994 and 1995 and is the best record of him speaking.
Is Gilles Deleuze still alive?
No. He was born in Paris on 18 January 1925 and died in Paris on 4 November 1995, aged 70.
Why is Deleuze criticised?
Partly for his difficulty. In Fashionable Nonsense (1997) the physicists Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont accused him of using mathematical and scientific terms without regard to their meaning, while saying they did not judge the rest of his work. Philosophers such as Alain Badiou and Slavoj Žižek have also criticised him, Žižek calling Anti-Oedipus his worst book.
Did Gilles Deleuze sign the 1977 petitions on the age of consent?
Yes. Deleuze and Guattari are listed among the signatories of an open letter in Le Monde on 26 January 1977, written by Gabriel Matzneff, that defended three men held in pre-trial detention for sexual relations with minors under fifteen. They also signed a petition in May 1977 to the commission revising the French penal code, which asked for an end to discrimination against homosexuals and for a review of the age of consent.
Footnotes
- Gilles Deleuze — Wikipedia
- Capitalism and Schizophrenia — Wikipedia
- Difference and Repetition — Wikipedia
- Spinoza: Practical Philosophy — Wikipedia
- French petitions against age-of-consent laws — Wikipedia
Bibliography last verified 9 October 2026. Where sources give different first-publication years, this page uses the year in library catalogues or the publisher’s own record.
This list was not put together by a machine.
The notes are all mine,
and the books are all his.
Lisanne x
Written by Lisanne Swart, who has curated reading lists and author guides at lisanneswart.com since 2021.
See more on her personal bookshelf.
“Conclusions should be read at the outset.”
— Gilles Deleuze, Difference and Repetition (1968), preface, translated by Paul Patton
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