Abstract

This article examines how Deleuze attempts to conceive the possibility of a non-Hegelian universal history by referring simultaneously to Nietzsche’s history of nihilism and to Marx’s history of social formations in the light of capitalism. It shows that this attempt involves a diagnosis of modernity after the historic failures of the nineteenth century messianisms. It also leads to the notion of becoming-revolutionary, which replaces Marx’s conception of revolution. From this triple point of view (universal history, the diagnosis of modernity, becoming-revolutionary), it would seem that Deleuze’s reading of Marx stems from his interpretation of Nietzsche.