This book documents Baudrillard's tempestuous encounters with semiology and structuralism. It illuminates in detail his efforts to destroy structural analyses from the inside by setting signification ablaze with his concept of symbolic exchange. Simultaneously, the book shows that Baudrillard's project to go beyond signification is frought with difficulties which return him to a semiotic scene saturated with all kinds of signs. The book situates Baudrillard's work in the broad spectrum of European and American semiotic traditions. The book also provides a critical appreciation of Baudrillard's key concept of symbolic exchange while tracing its maturation and its development over some thirty years of theorizing. Another feature of the book is its interesting discussion of Baudrillard's engagements with and debts to French theatre and literature with reference to Antoin Artaud, Alfred Jarry and Victor Segalen. Allied to the discussion of Baudrillard's relation to the thought of Deleuze, Guattari, Lacan, de Certeau and Lyotard, the book casts light on many neglected features of Baudrillard's work.