A systematic introduction into the mimetic theory of the French-American literary theorist and philosophical anthropologist Rene Girard, this essential text explains its three main pillars (mimetic desire, the scapegoat mechanism, and the Biblical -difference-) with the help of examples from literature and philosophy. This book also offers an overview of Rene Girard's life and work, showing how much mimetic theory results from existential and spiritual insights into one's own mimetic entanglements. Furthermore it examines the broader implications of Girard's theories, from the mimetic aspect...