EVENT AND ESSENCE

In a late interview, Deleuze claims that “I've tried in all my books to discover the nature of events; it's a philosophical concept, the only one capable of ousting the verb ‘to be’ and its attributes” (N 141). As we have seen, however, Badiou is manifestly correct in asserting that Deleuze's philosophy is wedded to ontology, primarily with respect to two themes, as we have seen: those of the univocity of being and of the virtual. We have also seen a great deal of evidence in Deleuze's own work to support this. Furthermore, it is not until The Logic of Sense that the theme of the event is treated in any substantial manner. Even in Difference and Repetition, the discussion is limited to a few pages that rehearse in a limited way the key points of the later book, but without granting the event as such pride of place. There he is concerned to specify further the nature of virtual Ideas: “Ideas are by no means essences. In so far as they are the objects of Ideas, problems belong on the side of events, affections, or accidents rather than on that of theorematic essences” (DR 187/242–3).

A much better characterization of Deleuze's thought of the event – which this quotation already indicates – is that it forms one half of a dyad with the concept of essence. However, the notion of essence in question must be distinguished from its orthodox acceptation.