The obscure subject of desire: Miguel de Beistegui's Moscow lectures

Abstract

Miguel de Beistegui scrutinizes the problem of desire in French philosophy in the second third of twentieth century. Kojève's interpretation of early Hegel proved to be the impetus that urged French thinkers from Sartre to Levinas to explore the problematic of desire. Particular importance must be attributed to Lacan's theory, as it is in the Lacanian version of psychoanalysis that the idea of desire as expressing a «lack» is considered to be the fundamental metaphysical principle. «The overcoming of metaphysics» presupposes a new treatment of desire, introduced under the influence of post-structuralist and neo-Nietzschean theories of Deleuze and Foucault.