Translated and with an Introduction by Daniel W. Smith

Afterword by Tom Conley

Gilles Deleuze had several paintings by Francis Bacon hanging in his Paris apartment, and the painter’s method and style as well as his motifs of seriality, difference, and repetition influenced Deleuze’s work. This first English translation shows us one of the most original and important French philosophers of the twentieth century in intimate confrontation with one of that century’s most original and important painters.

In considering Bacon, Deleuze offers implicit and explicit insights into the origins and development of his own philosophical and aesthetic ideas, ideas that represent a turning point in his intellectual trajectory. First published in French in 1981, Francis Bacon has come to be recognized as one of Deleuze’s most significant texts in aesthetics. Anticipating his work on cinema, the baroque, and literary criticism, the book can be read not only as a study of Bacon’s paintings but also as a crucial text within Deleuze’s broader philosophy of art.

In it, Deleuze creates a series of philosophical concepts, each of which relates to a particular aspect of Bacon’s paintings but at the same time finds a place in the “general logic of sensation.” Illuminating Bacon’s paintings, the nonrational logic of sensation, and the act of painting itself, this work—presented in lucid and nuanced translation—also points beyond painting toward connections with other arts such as music, cinema, and literature. Francis Bacon is an indispensable entry point into the conceptual proliferation of Deleuze’s philosophy as a whole.

Gilles Deleuze (1925–1995) was professor of philosophy at the University of Paris, Vincennes–St. Denis. He coauthored Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus with Félix Guattari. These works, as well as Cinema 1, Cinema 2, The Fold, Proust and Signs, and others, are published in English by Minnesota.

Daniel W. Smith teaches in the Department of Philosophy at Purdue University.

吉尔·德勒兹，法国哲学家。1925年1月18日生于法国巴黎，1944年中学毕业后就读于巴黎索邦大学哲学系。1957年任索邦大学哲学系助教，1960年任法国国家科学研究中心研究专员，1964年到1969年任里昂学院哲学教授，1969年接替米歇尔·福柯任巴黎第八大学哲学系教授直至1987年退休。1995年11月4日，因难忍肺疾折磨，从巴黎住处的窗户坠楼自杀。德勒兹的影响遍布人文科学的各个角落，代表作《反俄狄普斯》和《千座高原》业已取得世界性的声誉。

董强，北京大学法语系教授、博士生导师。1988年赴法国留学，旅居巴黎12年。早年师从世界文学大师昆德拉。1995年合作创办法国第一家以介绍中国文化为宗旨的出版社“中国蓝”。1997年成为以法语写作的外籍作家，同年获博士学位。2001年起受聘北京大学法语系。主要著作有：中法双语诗集《远方的手》（1997），法语诗集《松绑的手》（1997），法语专著《亨利·米肖的现代诗与绘画》（1998），专著《梁宗岱：穿越象征主义》（北京，2004）等。回国后致力于翻译法语文学与美术著作，逾二十余部，包括《小说的艺术》、《波德莱尔传》、《云的理论——为了建立一种新的绘画史》、《西方1500年视觉艺术史》。目前正在主持翻译《西方绘画大辞典》（即出）。