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"The publication in 1965 of For Marx and Reading Capital established Louis Althusser as one of the most original and controversial figures in the Western Marxist tradition; a thinker whose renewal of Marxism was to enjoy great influence over the next decade. Collected here are Althusser's most significant philosophical writings from 1965 to 1978; the majority previously untranslated. Intended to contribute, in his own words, to a ""left-wing critique of Stalinism that would help put some substance back into the revolutionary project here in the West,"" they are the record of a shared history. At the same time they chart Althusser's critique of the theoretical system unveiled in his own major works, and his developing practice of philosophy as a ""revolutionary weapon."" The collection opens with two lucid early articles-""Theory, Theoretical Practice and Theoretical Formation"" and ""On Theoretical Work."" The title piece-Althusser's celebrated lectures in the ""Philosophy Course for Scientists""-is the fullest exploration of his new definition of philosophy as politics in the realm of theory; a conception which is further developed in ""Lenin and Philosophy."" ""Is it Simple to be a Marxist in Philosophy?"" provides an invaluable account of Althusser's intellectual development. The volume concludes with two little-known late pieces-""The Transformation of Philosophy,"" in which the paradoxical history of Marxist philosophy is investigated; and ""Marxism Today,"" a sober balance-sheet of the Marxist tradition. Attesting to the unique place which Althusser has occupied in modern intellectual history-between a tradition of Marxism which he sought to reconstruct, and a ""post-Marxism"" which has eclipsed its predecessor-these texts are indispensable reading."

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Louis Althusser was born in Algeria in 1918 and died in France in 1990. He taught Philosophy for many years at the Ecole Normale Superieur in Paris, and was a leading intellectual in the French Communist Party.

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