From ontological difference to difference in itself: Heidegger and Deleuze

Abstract

The question of difference is one of, if not the, fundamental question(s) in twentieth-century continental philosophy. It is also a question to which both Heidegger and Deleuze respond, albeit in different ways. This chapter engages this overlap by taking up the difficult relationship between Heidegger and Deleuze to show some of the points of convergence and divergence between them. I focus primarily on Deleuze's assessment of Heidegger's early affirmation of the ontological difference, his claim that Heidegger offers a mistaken conception of univocity, and his conclusion that Heidegger's affirmation of the question of the meaning of being not only fails to properly think difference in and of itself but also, as a consequence, actually recuperates Heidegger into the Western metaphysical tradition that he aims to overcome. However, by engaging with Heidegger's thought and, indeed, offering potential Heideggerian responses to Deleuze's charges, I both complicate Deleuze's assessment and demonstrate the complexity of the issues engaged. Ultimately, I argue that although Deleuze continuously returns to Heidegger, Deleuze's relation to Heidegger is perhaps best understood in terms of something akin to a process of magnetic repulsion: although he is continually returned to different aspects of Heidegger's thought, every approximation gradually creates resistance that pushes Deleuze off in a different tangent from Heidegger without ever fully freeing Deleuze from Heidegger's orbit.