To see the presence of Spinoza, Louis Althusser once quipped, "one must at least have heard of him". The essays collected in this volume suggest that what applies to Althusser applies to his whole generation -- that Spinoza is an unsuspected but very real presence in the work of contemporary philosophers from Deleuze and Lacan to Foucault and Derrida.

These essays, most of them appearing in English for the first time, establish Spinoza's rightful role in the development and direction of contemporary continental philosophy. The volume should interest not only the growing group of scholars attracted to Spinoza's thought on ethics, politics, and subjectivity, but also theorists in a variety of fields who have not yet understood how their work can productively engage Spinoza.