--the rhizome idea is the shit. basically it's the idea that life, in reality, has no hierarchy. it's just us humans that give things hierarchies and power. life is actually flow. in other words, the taoists and buddhists were right-- but that doesn't mean we need to become monks. thus the paradox of western philosophy at the turn of D&G: how to understand life / time as flow (and space, as an "empty container," as a false idea -- which is what quantum physics and modified general relativity teach us) while at the same time realising that we need to struggle for a better world. the next step after Mille Plateaux, for me, is twofold: Brian Massumi's Parables for the Virtual (he's the translator, and today's primary Deleuzian, here in Montréal) & Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt's Empire (probably the best text that incorporates D&G into a completely modified global Marxist framework... ). have fun. MP is a heavy read & it bogs you down at points. if it does: read it non-linearily. skip to what's good. jump around. i've been reading it now for four years ...

nice that's a pretty good breakdown on the rhizome, I have a post coming with more thoughts. Read Empire already, but on my PDA, sort of odd, probably due in for a second round at some point, wish the cover wasn't so damn ugly... And yeah the non-linear reading is good advice, discovered that with Anti-Oedipus.

It's the nomadology, lines of flight and flows inherent in the rhizome that appeal to me ;) And I'm curious to know what your exact criteria for "utility" are ...