A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia (French: Mille plateaux) is a 1980 philosophy book by French authors Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, respectively a philosopher and a psychoanalyst. A Thousand Plateaus is written in a non-linear fashion, and the reader is invited to move among plateaux in any order. It is the second volume of Capitalism and Schizophrenia, and the successor to Anti-Oedipus (1972). Before the full English translation by social theorist Brian Massumi appeared in 1988, the twelfth "plateau" was published separately as Nomadology: The War Machine (New York: Semiotext(e), 1986).

Summary

A Thousand Plateaus is written in a non-linear fashion, and the reader is invited to move among plateaux in any order. These stylistic choices are entangled in the book's content, as made apparent in the introductory section on "rhizomes". Deleuze and Guattari discuss concepts such as the Body without Organs, and a range of subjects including semiotics. They evaluate and criticize the work of Sigmund Freud, referring to the case histories of Little Hans and the Wolf Man. Deleuze and Guattari consider Carl Jung "profounder than Freud". Deleuze and Guattari also evaluate works of literature by a variety of authors, including Henry James' In the Cage (1898), F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Crack-Up (1945) and H. P. Lovecraft's "Through the Gates of the Silver Key" (1934), which they call one of his masterpieces. They also refer to Frank Herbert's science fiction novel Children of Dune (1976).

Mille Plateaux is an influential electronica record label founded 1993 by Achim Szepanski in Frankfurt, Germany. It is known for mostly releasing minimal techno, glitch music and other experimental electronic music.

History

In 2000, to take advantage of the popularity of glitch music in the electronic music scene, Mille Plateaux released their Clicks & Cuts Series, which showed both Mille Plateaux and non-Mille Plateaux glitch music luminaries exploring the genre.

In early 2004, Mille Plateaux parent company Force Inc. Music Works went bankrupt due to the collapse of Germany's main independent music distributor, EFA-Medien. Mille Plateaux and other Force Inc. Music Works owned labels were folded at that time. The label was revived briefly in late 2004 under the name MillePlateauxMedia, with 4 releases. In 2005, two releases were made by RAI STREUBEL MUSIC S.L. on the label Supralinear with the note "by Mille Plateaux".

In 2006, Mille Plateaux (along with the other former Force Inc. Music Works labels Force Inc. and Force Tracks) was taken over by the Berlin-based company Disco Inc. Ltd., who only released two CD albums.