Stuart Elden - The Early Foucault-Polity (2021)

The Early Foucault
This book is the third of four major intellectual histories of Michel

Foucault, exploring newly released archival material and covering the
French thinker’s entire academic career.
Foucault’s Last Decade was published by Polity in 2016.

Foucault: The Birth of Power was published in 2017.
The Archaeology of Foucault will publish in the early 2020s.
The Early Foucault
Stuart Elden
polity
Copyright © Stuart Elden 2021
The right of Stuart Elden to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted in
accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 2021 by Polity Press
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Title: The early Foucault / Stuart Elden.
Description: Cambridge ; Medford, MA : Polity, 2021. | Includes
bibliographical references and index. | Summary: “The first intellectual
history of Foucault’s early career”-- Provided by publisher.
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9781509525959 (hardback) | ISBN 9781509525966 (paperback) | ISBN
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Subjects: LCSH: Foucault, Michel, 1926-1984.
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Contents
Acknowledgements vii
Abbreviations and Archival References x
Introduction 1
1 Studying Philosophy and Psychology in Paris 7
2 Teaching at Lille and the École Normale Supérieure 28
3 Psychology and Mental Illness 53
4 Translating Binswanger and von Weizsäcker 80
5 Nietzsche and Heidegger 109
6 Madness– Uppsala to Warsaw 126
7 Hamburg, Kant 148
8 Defence, Publication, Reception, Revision 166
Coda: Towards Archaeology 189
Notes 193
Index 265
Acknowledgements
As a part of a series of books on Foucault, a project which has been

intermittent since 2000 and intense since 2013, there is a continuing
and overlapping debt to those thanked before.
I particularly thank Mark Kelly for sparking the initial idea;
Margaret Atack for sharing David Macey’s correspondence and inter-
view transcripts from his research for The Lives of Michel Foucault;
Aner Barzilay for conversations on the early Foucault and sharing
transcriptions of student notes; Didier Eribon for allowing me to
see Foucault’s letters to Georges Dumézil; Stefanos Geroulanos for
sharing other material by Dumézil; Laurent Feneyrou for access to
the Foucault–Jean Barraqué correspondence; Paul Griffiths for his
notes on that correspondence; and Daniele Lorenzini for conversa-
tions about Foucault and the posthumous publication programme.
I remain grateful to Daniel Defert and Henri-Paul Fruchaud. At a
late stage, Daniele and Alison Downham Moore generously read the
entire manuscript and made some useful suggestions.
For the first time I have employed research assistants to help with
some foreign language material. Oscar Jängnemyr provided summa-
ries or translations of Swedish texts about Foucault’s time in Uppsala;
Julia Jasińska summarized a Polish book; Federico Testa summarized
Alessandro de Lima Francisco and Marcio Luiz Miotto’s unpublished
Portuguese theses, which they kindly sent to me; and Melissa Pawelski
located some archival documents, shared notes, and translated a key
text about Foucault’s time in Hamburg.
I gratefully acknowledge the British Academy/Leverhulme small
grant SRG1819\191434, supported by the Department for Business,
viii Acknowledgements
Energy and Industrial Strategy, and the Department of Politics and

International Studies and the Humanities Research Centre at the
University of Warwick for funding archival visits.
For access to archival material I thank the Archives littéraires
suisses, Berne; Archives Nationales, Pierrefitte-sur-Seine; Bibliothèque
interuniversitaire Sorbonne; Bibliothèque Lettres Ulm, École Normale
Supérieure; Bibliothèque-Musée de l’Opéra; Bibliothèque nationale de
France-Richelieu, archives et manuscrits, especially Laurence le Bras;
Bibliothèque nationale de France-Richelieu-Louvois, département de
musique; Nathalie Queyroux and David Denéchaud at the Centre
d’Archives en Philosophie, History et Édition des Sciences (CAPHÉS),
École Normale Supérieure; Carolina Rediviva Library, special collec-
tions room, Uppsala University; Collège de France; Institut Mémoires
de l’édition contemporaine (IMEC), Caen; Staats- und Unibibliothek
Hamburg; Staatsarchiv Hamburg; Staatsarchiv Thurgau, Frauenfeld;
Universitätsarchiv Tübingen; and Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript
Library, Yale University. Peter Harrington Books in Chelsea allowed
me to consult a rare copy of the pre-thesis version of Folie et déraison.
I have used several other libraries to find material for this study:
Bibliothèque nationale de France–François Mitterand; Bibliothèque
Sainte-Geneviève; Bodleian Library, University of Oxford; British
Library Rare Books room and Newsroom; Senate House Library; the
Tate Library; the Warburg Institute; Wellcome Library; and the librar-
ies of the University of Amsterdam, Columbia University, London
School of Economics, University College London and University of
Warwick. Warwick staff were very helpful in getting hard-to-find
material through the document supply service.
Several other people encouraged, sourced texts or answered ques-
tions, and I am grateful to them all: Valentina Antoniol, Christian
Abrahamsson, Edward Baring, Elisabetta Basso, Luiza Bialasiewicz,
Ryan Bishop, Giuseppe Blanco, Natalie Bouchard, Kurt Borg,
Neil Brenner, Chris Brooke, Sebastian Budgen, Graham Burchell,
Douglas Burnham, Oliver Davis, Alfred Denker, Elgin Diaz, Klaus
Dodds, ‘Ambulo Ergosum’, Mike Featherstone, Colin Gordon,
G. M. Goshgarian, Kélina Gotman, Victor Gourevitch, Anna Gumucio
Ramberg, Peter Gratton, Inanna Hamati-Ataya, Bernard Harcourt,
Marcelo Hoffman, Richard Howard, Luke Ilott, Orazio Irrera, Scott
Johnson, Gerry Kearns, Philipp Kender, Anna Krakus, Léopold
Lambert, Scott Lash, Stephen Legg, Kai Frederik Lorentzen, Jeff
Malpas, Eduardo Mendieta, José Luis Moreno Pestaña, Adam David
Morton, Rainer Nicolaysen, Hidefumi Nishiyama, Clare O’Farrell,
Gunnar Olsson, Mate Paksy, William Parkhurst, Paul Patton, ‘Petra’,
Lucas Pohl, Sverre Raffnsøe, John Duke Raimo, Simon Reid-Henry,
Acknowledgements ix
John Russell, Parastou Saberi, Philippe Sabot, Christopher Smith, Bal

Sokhi-Bulley, Robert A. Tally, Cristina Vatulescu, Nick Vaughan-
Williams, Pierre Vesperini, Jean-Baptiste Vuillerod, David Webb,
Richard Wilson, and Andreja Zevnik.
I also thank the readers of my Progressive Geographies blog who
followed this project through its development. Some resources pro-
duced during this work are available at www.progressivegeographies.
com/resources/foucault-resources.
Work in this book was presented to audiences at ACCESS Europe,
University of Amsterdam; Complutense University of Madrid;
Institute of Historical Research, University of London; University
of Sussex; Theory, Culture and Society; and University of Warwick.
Planned talks at the University of Bologna, New York University
and University of Oxford were unfortunately cancelled due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. Late stages of the research were conducted
around travel restrictions and partial lockdown, and the manuscript
completed in challenging academic circumstances. For support in
this, and much else, I thank Susan.
At Polity Press I am grateful to Pascal Porcheron, Ellen Macdonald-
Kramer, and John Thompson, and the readers of the original proposal
for their enthusiasm for my work. In particular I thank Pascal and
two anonymous readers for their comments on the manuscript. Susan
Beer copy-edited the text and Lisa Scholey compiled the index.
An earlier version of parts of Chapter 4 appeared as ‘Foucault as
Translator of Binswanger and von Weizsäcker’ in Theory, Culture
and Society. The material is reused with Sage’s permission.
Abbreviations and Archival References
Key texts are referred to by abbreviations. For books translated as

a single book the French page number is given first, followed by the
English after a slash. With GK and D&E the German is first, followed
by the French, and, for D&E, also the English.
English titles are used for work available in translation; French for
untranslated works or unpublished manuscripts, though a translation
of the title is provided the first time mentioned. I have frequently
modified existing translations.
With the different editions of the History of Madness, I have usually
made reference to the 1972 French edition and the 2005 translation
(HM), unless there is a textual issue at stake.
Texts by Foucault and others

APPV Immanuel Kant, Anthropologie in pragmatischer Hinsicht,
Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 2000; Anthropologie du point
de vue pragmatique and Introduction à l’Anthropologie,
trans. Michel Foucault, Paris: Vrin, 2009; Anthropology
from a Pragmatic Point of View, trans. Robert B. Louden,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. References
are to Akademie Ausgabe pagination, found in the mar-
gins of all editions.
C Daniel Defert, ‘Chronologie’, DE I, 13–64; trans. Timothy
O’Leary in Christopher Falzon, Timothy O’Leary and
Jana Sawicki (eds) A Companion to Foucault, Oxford:
Abbreviations and Archival References xi
Blackwell, 2013, 11–83. Defert’s shorter revised chronol-

ogy appears in Œuvres.
CH Philippe Artières, Jean-François Bert, Frédéric Gros and
Judith Revel (eds), Michel Foucault: Cahier L’Herne,
Paris: L’Herne, 2011.
DE Dits et écrits 1954–1988, eds Daniel Defert and François
Ewald, Paris: Gallimard, 4 vols, 1994– with text number
to allow reference to the two editions of this text and
bibliographies of English translations.1 Thus ‘DE#1 I,
65–119’ means text 1, in vol. I, 65–119.
D&E Ludwig Binswanger, Traum und Existenz, Bern-Berlin:
Gachnang and Springer, 1992; Le Rêve et l’existence, trans.
Jacqueline Verdeaux, Introduction and Notes by Michel
Foucault, Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1954; trans. Jacob
Needleman in Dream and Existence, ed. Keith Hoeller,
Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1993, 81–105.
DIE ‘Dream, Imagination and Existence’, trans. Forrest
Williams, in Dream and Existence, ed. Keith Hoeller,
Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1993, 29–78.
DL Raymond Roussel, Paris: Gallimard, 1963; Death and
the Labyrinth: The World of Raymond Roussel, trans.
Charles Ruas, London: Continuum, 2004 [1986].
E Roger-Pol Droit, Michel Foucault, Entretiens, Odile
Jacob, Paris, 2004.
EW Essential Works, eds Paul Rabinow and James Faubion,
trans. Robert Hurley and others, London: Penguin, 3 vols,
1997–2000.
FD1 Folie et déraison: Histoire de la folie à l’âge classique,
Paris: Plon, 1961. Reprinted in 1964 by Plon; abridged in
1964 as FD2.
FD2 Folie et déraison: Histoire de la folie à l’âge classique,
Paris: UGE, 1964 (abridged edition of FD1); Madness and
Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason,
trans. Richard Howard, London: Routledge, 1989 [1965].
FL Foucault Live: Interviews 1961–1984, ed. Sylvère
Lotringer, New York: Semiotext[e], 1996.
FM Foucault à Münsterlingen: À l’origine de l’Histoire de la
folie, eds Jean-François Bert and Elisabetta Basso, Paris:
EHESS, 2015.
1
Richard A. Lynch, ‘Michel Foucault’s Shorter Works in English’, in Christopher
Falzon, Timothy O’Leary and Jana Sawicki (eds), A Companion to Foucault,
Oxford: Blackwell, 2013, 562–92.
xii Abbreviations and Archival References
FMT ‘Foucault: Matérialité d’un travail. Entretien avec Daniel

Defert par Alain Brossat, avec le concours de Philippe
Chevallier’, in Orazio Irrera and Salvo Vaccaro (eds), La
Pensée politique de Foucault, Paris: Kimé, 2017, 215–
36; ‘Foucault: The Materiality of a Working Life– A n
Interview with Daniel Defert by Alain Brossat, assisted
by Philippe Chevallier’, trans. Colin Gordon, Foucault
Studies 21, 2016, 214–30.
GA Martin Heidegger, Gesamtausgabe, Frankfurt am Main:
Vittorio Klostermann, 1975ff.
GK Viktor von Weizsäcker, Der Gestaltkreis: Theorie der
Einheit von Wahrnehmen und Bewegen, Frankfurt am
Main: Suhrkamp, 1973 [1940]; Le cycle de la structure,
trans. Michel Foucault and Daniel Rocher, Paris: Desclée
de Brouwer, 1958.
HM Histoire de la folie à l’âge classique, Paris: Gallimard, 1972
(revised version of FD1 with new preface and two appen-
dices; reissued in 1976 in Gallimard’s Tel series with same
pagination but no appendices); History of Madness, trans.
Jonathan Murphy and Jean Khalfa, London: Routledge,
2006.
IKA Immanuel Kant, Anthropologie du point de vue pragma-
tique and Michel Foucault, Introduction à l’Anthropologie,
Paris: Vrin, 2009; Introduction to Kant’s Anthropology,
trans. Roberto Nigro and Kate Briggs, Semiotext(e),
2009.
KSA Friedrich Nietzsche, Sämtliche Werke: Kritische
Studienausgabe, eds Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari,
Berlin: de Gruyter, 15 vols, 1980.
LMD La Grande Étrangère: À propos de littérature, eds Philippe
Artières, Jean-François Bert, Mathieu Potte-Bonneville and
Judith Revel, Paris: EHESS, 2013; Language, Madness,
Desire, trans. Robert Bonnano, Minneapolis: University
of Minnesota Press, 2015.
MMPe Maladie mentale et personnalité, Paris: PUF, 1954.
MMPs Maladie mentale et psychologie, Paris: PUF, 1962 (exten-
sively revised version of MMPe); Mental Illness and
Psychology, trans. Alan Sheridan, Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1987 [1976].
Œ Œuvres, Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, ed. Frédéric Gros,
Paris: Gallimard, 2 vols., 2015.
OD L’Ordre du discours, Paris: Gallimard, 1970; ‘The Order
of Discourse’, trans. Thomas Scott-Railton in Nancy
Abbreviations and Archival References xiii
Luxon (ed.) Archives of Infamy: Foucault on State Power

in the Lives of Ordinary Citizens, Minneapolis: University
of Minnesota Press, 2019, 141–73.
PPC Politics, Philosophy, Culture: Interviews and Other
Writings 1977–84, ed. Lawrence D. Kritzman, London:
Routledge, 1990.
SBD Le Beau Danger: Entretien avec Claude Bonnefoy, Paris:
EHESS, 2011; Speech Begins after Death: In Conversation
with Claude Bonnefoy, trans. Robert Bonnano,
Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2013.
SKP Space, Knowledge and Power: Foucault and Geography,
eds Jeremy W. Crampton and Stuart Elden, Aldershot:
Ashgate, 2007.
SP Philippe Artières and Jean-François Bert, Un Succès
philosophique: L’Histoire de la folie à l’âge classique de
Michel Foucault, Caen: Presses universitaires de Caen,
2011.
TS Luther H. Martin, Huck Gutman and Patrick H. Hutton
(eds), Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel
Foucault, London: Tavistock, 1988.
Archival material
BEIN Michel Foucault Library of Presentation Copies, Beinecke
Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
BNF Fonds Michel Foucault, Archives et Manuscrits,
Bibliothèque Nationale de France
CAPHÉS Fonds Georges Canguilhem and Fonds Gérard Simon,
Centre d’Archives en Philosophie, Histoire et Édition des
Sciences, École Normale Supérieure
DMZ Fonds Georges Dumézil, Collège de France
HYP Fonds Jean Hyppolite, Bibliothèque Lettres Ulm, École
Normale Supérieure
IMEC Fonds Centre Michel Foucault, Fonds Louis Althusser,
Fonds Jacques Derrida and Fonds La Table Ronde,
L’Institut Mémoires de l’édition contemporaine, l’abbaye
d’Ardenne, Caen
NC 1874 Alliance Française d’Upsal (Franska Alliansen, Uppsala),
Uppsala University special collections, Carolina Rediviva
Library
StATG Archiv Roland Kuhn, Staatsarchiv des Kantons Thurgau,
Frauenfeld
xiv Abbreviations and Archival References
StAHbg Archiv Institut Français de Hambourg, Staatsarchiv

Hamburg
UAT Archiv Ludwig Binswanger, Universitätsarchiv Tübingen
Note
Unpaginated manuscripts have a page number in brackets, with ‘r’
recto and ‘v’ verso used when needed. Given the nature of the mate-
rials, these are correct to the time consulted– m
aterial can be moved,
reversed or misplaced.
Introduction
In the late 1970s Foucault said to Jean-Pierre Barou: ‘when I die, I will
leave no manuscripts’.1 Writing in 1993, his biographer David Macey
judged that ‘he came close to fulfilling that promise’. Foucault’s close
friend Hervé Guibert ‘was ordered to destroy the drafts of the final
volumes of Histoire de la sexualité and all the preparatory materials’.2
This was due to Foucault’s wish that no one do to him what Max
Brod had done to Franz Kafka.3 We now know that neither Foucault
nor Macey was correct.
The publication of Foucault’s thirteen Collège de France courses
has been supplemented by volumes of lectures given elsewhere. Other
lectures, transcriptions of radio programmes, interviews and discus-
sions have all appeared in the past several years. Most notably, the
fourth volume of the History of Sexuality, Les Aveux de la chair
[Confessions of the Flesh] appeared in early 2018.4 Attention is now
turning to materials relating to courses given at universities in France,
Brazil and Tunisia from the 1950s and 1960s. In addition, Foucault’s
working notes and manuscripts are available at the Bibliothèque
Nationale de France.5
This book is chronologically the first of a sequence of four books
providing an account of Michel Foucault’s entire career. It is the
third to be written, following Foucault’s Last Decade and Foucault:
The Birth of Power.6 The missing years of 1962–9, from Birth of the
Clinic to The Archaeology of Knowledge, will be the topic of the
final volume, The Archaeology of Foucault. The order of the books’
writing has in large part been dictated by the availability of materials
either by posthumous publication or in the archive.
2 Introduction
The focus here is on the very earliest Foucault, from the traces of
his intellectual formation until the publication and defence of his
thesis Folie et déraison: Histoire de la folie à l’âge classique in 1961.
That work, better known in French simply as Histoire de la folie
and in English as the History of Madness, was a book that Foucault
regularly described as his first, marginalizing his earlier works as
peripheral and insignificant.
Foucault certainly did not publish much before 1961– the short
book Maladie mentale et personnalité, a couple of book chapters, a
long introduction to a translation, a book-length translation, and a
short book notice. All those publications are discussed in this book,
of course, but its sources are deeper. The posthumous publications
and the archives are invaluable to this approach. Like the previous
books, this book makes use of all available material in tracing a story
of intellectual history. Yet while this book is not itself a biography,
compared to Foucault’s Last Decade and Foucault: The Birth of
Power it does use more biographical sources. This is because there are
relatively few other pieces of evidence for this early part of Foucault’s
career. There are almost no interviews from this period; Foucault
published little compared to later periods; and because he was not yet
famous, there are fewer contemporary accounts of his work.
This is also, relatively speaking, a period which has been neglected
by his commentators. Back in 1993, biographer James Miller com-
plained that ‘the available evidence for Foucault’s early intellectual
itinerary is sketchy, and open to different interpretations’.7 Today
the sources are more extensive, though doubtless the possibility of
multiple readings remains. There are good reasons for this beyond
the limited publications. For one, Foucault did much to try to cover
over the traces of this period. He tried, albeit unsuccessfully, to pre-
vent the re-edition of his 1954 book; eventually consenting to revise
it in 1962 as Maladie mentale et psychologie so that it removed some
of the claims that no longer worked with his later writing. But that
version too went out of print in the late 1960s. His two early trans-
lations, of the psychologist Ludwig Binswanger and the physician
Viktor von Weizsäcker, went out of print, and when the Binswanger
translation was republished it was without his long introduction
and his role in the translation and its notes was unmentioned. His
other publications from the 1950s were in such obscure outlets that
even French readers had little access to them: it was only with the
publication of Dits et écrits ten years after his death that they were
collected and more widely available. One short review was missed by
the editors of that volume. Of these early texts only the Binswanger
introduction has been translated into English. Maladie mentale et
Introduction 3
psychologie has been translated, but that only gives a partial insight
into the original book.
While much has been preserved in archives, much has also been
lost. There are almost no extant materials relating to Foucault’s
teaching in Uppsala, Warsaw and Hamburg. The only records of
some of Foucault’s early 1950s lectures in France are in the form of
student notes. Draft materials were often discarded or reused as scrap
paper. There is also a long-standing rumour that Foucault and the
sociologist Jean-Claude Passeron ghost-wrote articles for the French
Communist Party (PCF) journal La Nouvelle Critique in the early
1950s, stemming from two conversations with the author and diarist
Claude Mauriac.8 Neither Foucault’s first biographer Didier Eribon
nor Macey was able to substantiate these rumours, and no new evi-
dence seems to have come to light since.9 There is also the tantalizing
mention of a text written by Foucault on René Descartes in 1952,
which was commissioned by the PCF for the journal Clarté. It was
apparently considered too difficult for students and not published.10
No archive seems to have a copy of this text, whose non-publication
frustrated Foucault and contributed to his growing distance from the
party (C 18/18).
Reading and Writing

While Foucault’s childhood and early schooling will not be discussed
here, an anecdote told by his brother, Denys Foucault, is revealing.11
Foucault’s father Paul was a well-known surgeon and medical practi-
tioner, whose Titres et travaux scientifiques was published by a local
press the year Foucault was born.12 Foucault’s mother Anne was the
daughter of a surgeon and anatomy professor at the University of
Poitiers. In their childhood home in Vendeuvre-du-Poitou, there were
two libraries– the father’s and the mother’s. His father’s library, in
his study, was medical and off-limits; the library of his mother was
literary and free to use. If the former would dominate Foucault’s
interests through the 1950s and early 1960s, in his work on psy-
chology, madness and medicine, with traces throughout his career;
the literary would be a theme to which he often returned. It was in
their mother’s library, Denys Foucault suggests, that Michel found
Honoré de Balzac, Gustav Flaubert, and classical literature. He wrote
on these topics, from an afterword to Flaubert’s Temptation of Saint
Anthony to a lecture on that text and Bouvard and Pécuchet, and one
on Balzac’s The Search for the Absolute, both given at SUNY Buffalo
in 1970.13 His writings in the 1960s for Critique and Tel Quel, on
4 Introduction
writers including Georges Bataille, Maurice Blanchot, André Breton,

Pierre Klossowski, Alain Robbe-Grillet, the Marquis de Sade, and
Jules Verne, and of course his book on Raymond Roussel in 1963, all
show this enduring literary interest.14
In an interview, Foucault’s partner Daniel Defert says a great deal
about his working practices. Foucault apparently worked to a very
strict schedule, likening it to a factory job (FMT 215–16/214). He
would leave his apartment to reach the library at 9am, often by bicy-
cle, and continue working there until 5.30 or 6pm (FMT 216/215,
232/227). The evenings would be spent on ‘his social and political
life’, followed by an hour of reading. This rhythm was not broken at
weekends, nor on public holidays, and rarely on vacations. Defert’s
recollection is largely of later periods in Foucault’s life– they met in
1960, and much of this relates to the period after Foucault’s return to
France from Tunisia. But Foucault had got into these habits early. As
a student at the École Normale Supérieure (ENS) he used its library on
the rue d’Ulm, as well as the Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève situated
between the Sorbonne and the Panthéon in the Latin Quarter. From
the early 1950s he became an habitué of the Bibliothèque Nationale
de France (BNF), then entirely situated on the rue Richelieu near the
Louvre and the Palais Royal. This building, with rooms designed by
Henri Labrouste, is where the bulk of Foucault’s papers are archived
today. Even when based in Uppsala, Warsaw and Hamburg, he would
regularly return there on visits to Paris. He resumed working there
on a daily basis in the 1960s, apart from while in Tunisia, and this
continued until 1979 when he moved to work at the Bibliothèque du
Saulchoir.15 As Eribon suggests, the BNF was ‘no doubt the one place
in which Foucault spent the most years of his life’.16
While the printed texts and some manuscripts, such as the
Clairambault and Joly de Fleury collections, were located in the BNF,
Foucault also used other libraries in Paris, including the Bibliothèque
historique de la ville de Paris.17 He also worked with materials at the
Archives Nationales, and the Bastille archives and the library of the
duc de La Vallière at the Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal.18 As Chapter 6
will show, the Carolina Rediviva library at Uppsala University was
also important, though not as much as is often said.
While the research was done in the libraries, the writing itself
would generally be done at home. Foucault tended to write his books
multiple times, in handwritten drafts, which were then developed
over time. He would often discard pages and rewrite them anew,
rather than cross out material and insert the changes (FMT 225/222,
234–5/229). As the archives show, many of the discarded pages
were reused for other purposes, with reading notes or lectures on the
Introduction 5
reverse, or folded in half to group notes on a theme.19 Defert says that

the table on which Foucault wrote History of Madness in Uppsala
is still the one in his apartment (FMT 223/220). But while Foucault
would write drafts of most of his future books in Paris, he had a habit
of finishing them at the family home in Vendeuvre-du-Poitou, where
he spent each summer (FMT 223/220).
Structure of this Study

Foucault usually referred to History of Madness as his first book.
It is where he begins his candidacy presentation for his chair at the
Collège de France, written in 1969, for example (DE#71 I, 842–3;
EW I, 5–6). Foucault goes on to situate Birth of the Clinic, The Order
of Things and The Archaeology of Knowledge within an overall nar-
rative, and then outlines how his research would develop if he were
to be elected to the position. That chronology is well established in
the literature, though newly available and forthcoming materials add
to it, and the literary is a crucial parallel theme. This period will be
discussed in The Archaeology of Foucault. But how Foucault arrived
at its putative beginning is a far from straightforward story. While
many studies of Foucault begin with the first major book, History of
Madness, in 1961, that is where this book ends.
This book therefore offers an account of the long process that led
to that major work. Chapter 1 discusses Foucault’s university studies
in Paris, in philosophy and psychology, and particularly analyses his
diploma thesis on Hegel under the supervision of Jean Hyppolite.
Chapter 2 looks at the beginning of Foucault’s own teaching career
in Lille and Paris, using various archival sources, and discusses some
unpublished manuscripts which may have developed from teaching
materials. Chapter 3 discusses the texts he actually published in
this period, which are a fraction of what he wrote. Newly available
sources help to resolve long-standing issues about the dating of these
texts. In Chapter 4, his work as a co-translator of Binswanger and
von Weizsäcker is analysed, showing how Foucault and his colleagues
rendered German into French.
All these early publications were completed before Foucault moved
to Uppsala in 1955. That move is a break in his career, initiating a
period of sustained research for the History of Madness alongside the
engagement with new inspirations, notably the philosophers Friedrich
Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger and the comparative mythologist
and philologist Georges Dumézil. His engagement with Nietzsche and
Heidegger is the subject of Chapter 5, along with the intellectual side
6 Introduction
of his relationship with the modernist composer Jean Barraqué. The

research and writing he did in Uppsala and Warsaw on madness is
the focus of Chapter 6, which also discusses his teaching and cultural
activities. Chapter 7 examines the year he spent in Hamburg when
he translated Immanuel Kant’s Anthropology. Chapter 8 looks at
the defence, publication and abridgement of the History of Madness,
and how Foucault was led by this work to revise his first book. The
last pages explore how themes from this period point towards his
concerns in the 1960s.
While this book, therefore, has its focus on how Foucault’s career
led to the History of Madness, it shows a number of other paths
explored but not ultimately taken. Among other themes, it shows
Foucault’s detailed readings of Hegel, the phenomenologist Edmund
Husserl and Kant, all of which led to substantial manuscripts,
which he chose not to publish. Foucault’s engagement with the
Daseinsanalysis movement, while long known, given the introduction
to the Binswanger translation, goes much deeper and archival sources
help to substantiate its importance. Foucault’s concern with the ques-
tion of philosophical anthropology is also significant. The encounter
with Nietzsche and Heidegger, while long known to be crucial, is
here explored anew in the light of new or neglected sources. This
book also analyses his profound yet critical interest in psychology
– as a student, researcher and teacher. The importance of teachers,
including Louis Althusser, Hyppolite, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and
Jean Wahl, in his intellectual formation is explored, as is the influence
on his later development by people who never taught him, including
Georges Canguilhem and Dumézil. The book utilizes archival sources
extensively to fill in details of his teaching, writing and plans for
abandoned theses. In the years covered here, Foucault was insti-
tutionally located in Paris, Lille, Uppsala, Warsaw, Hamburg and
Clermont-Ferrand. All of these settings are significant in the story,
which has a geography as much as a history. In tracking and mapping
it I have found myself retracing some of Foucault’s own steps.
1
Studying Philosophy and Psychology
in Paris
Foucault moved to the Lycée Henri-IV in Paris in 1945 shortly after

the war ended, where he was briefly taught by Hyppolite. Foucault
studied philosophy, history and literature in French, German,
English, Latin and Greek, reading widely in classical texts. This was
the khâgne class to prepare for the concours entrance exam for the
ENS. Foucault had failed that exam in 1945 while still studying in
Poitiers, but passed in 1946.1 He had also support from Maurice Rat,
a family friend who taught at the Lycée Janson-de-Sailly and had
passed the agrégation in grammar in 1919.2 Foucault entered the ENS
in Autumn 1946 and over the next several years he attended lectures
both at its rue d’Ulm site and at the nearby Sorbonne. Foucault was
awarded a licence in philosophy in 1948 and one in psychology in
1949. He also received a diplôme in general psychology from the
Paris Institut de Psychologie in 1949.3 At the ENS Foucault was
taught by Jean Beaufret, Jean-Toussaint Desanti, Merleau-Ponty and,
from 1948, Louis Althusser. At the Sorbonne he attended classes by
Daniel Lagache and Julian Ajuriaguerra on psychiatric science; Henri
Gouhier, Merleau-Ponty, Wahl and Hyppolite on philosophy.4 While
he also read his teachers’ work, much of their importance comes from
the classes they taught. Years later, Lagache was on Foucault’s thesis
jury, Gouhier its chair, Hyppolite the rapporteur for his second thesis
(see Chapter 8).
8 Studying Philosophy and Psychology in Paris
Philosophy and its History

Beaufret taught widely across the history of philosophy. He is best
known as the recipient of Heidegger’s Letter on Humanism, sent in
response to questions Beaufret posed in 1946.5 He is the author of
the four-volume Dialogues avec Heidegger,6 and known for his long
introduction and translation of Parmenides’ poem, often known as
‘On Nature’.7 However, Beaufret apparently never taught a course on
Heidegger, thinking his thought could not be summarized.8 Instead
his teaching covered Plato and Aristotle; Descartes, Gottfried Leibniz,
Baruch Spinoza; Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche and Husserl.9 Heidegger’s
thought does influence much of Beaufret’s teaching: with the exception
of Spinoza, these figures were the focus of most of Heidegger’s own
teaching career. Foucault kept notes on what appear to be lectures by
Beaufret on Kant and Spinoza.10 Beaufret eventually taught a short
course on Heidegger’s Being and Time at a lycée in 1972.11 Beaufret
fought for France in the war, escaped from a prisoner-of-war camp,
and joined the resistance. He has been criticized for his uncritical atti-
tude to Heidegger’s Nazi past and for his own alleged anti-Semitism
and Holocaust denial.12
Desanti was a philosopher of mathematics, a student of Jean
Cavaillès, but also a phenomenologist, Spinoza scholar and a member
of the PCF until 1956.13 When Jacques Derrida finally submitted
his Doctorat d’État in 1980, based on publications, it was directed
by Desanti. Derrida’s original supervisor had been Hyppolite, but
that thesis was never completed.14 Gouhier mainly worked on French
philosophy between Descartes and Bergson, and it seems Foucault
attended lectures by him on both.15 Gouhier was also an authority
on the theatre, and also helped to edit works by Maine de Biran,
Auguste Comte and Henri Bergson’s lectures.16 He was the supervisor
of Pierre Bourdieu’s dissertation on Leibniz, a translation and com-
mentary on the Animadversiones in partem generalem Principiorum
cartesianorum.17 In 1978 Gouhier would invite Foucault to a lecture
to the Société française de philosophie only published after Foucault’s
death, known as ‘What is Critique?’18
These figures gave Foucault a broad education in philosophy, but
central to his subsequent development was Wahl, a wide-ranging
philosopher and historian of philosophy, who worked especially on
Plato, Hegel, Nietzsche and Heidegger. He wrote a key work for the
French engagement with Hegel in 1929 and a major, 750-page study
of Kierkegaard in 1938, one of the first French engagements with
existentialism.19 His Human Existence and Transcendence was pub-
Studying Philosophy and Psychology in Paris 9
lished in 1944 but, unlike Jean-Paul Sartre’s work from the previous
year, has only recently been translated.20 Wahl was also significant
in terms of his engagement with Anglophone work, a textbook on
French philosophy, and a general introduction on Philosophies of
Existence.21 Wahl ran the Collège philosophique at which Derrida
presented ‘Cogito and the History of Madness’ in 1963; and would
invite Foucault to give the ‘What is an Author?’ lecture to the Société
française de philosophie in 1969.22
Crucially for Foucault, Wahl taught on Heidegger from the mid
1940s through the 1950s. Derrida recalls that Heidegger was very
much a presence at the ENS due to Beaufret and Hyppolite.23 But
Wahl’s Sorbonne courses did much more. They were based on both on
his reading of published texts, but also his knowledge of Heidegger’s
courses of the 1920s and 1930s.24 Despite some reports, Wahl did not
attend lectures himself, noting in a letter to Heidegger of December
1937 that he ‘would love to meet with you one day. But all sorts
of obstacles stand in the way at present.’25 Foremost among those
obstacles was his Jewish heritage, which meant he left Europe during
the war. But Wahl certainly had access to notes from Heidegger’s
courses.
Wahl’s introductory course from January to June 1946 discussed
Being and Time, but also Heidegger’s work on Kant and his discussion
of truth, which as Jean Montenot notes closely parallels Heidegger’s
own 1928–9 course at the University of Freiburg Einleitung in die
Philosophie [Introduction to Philosophy] (GA27).26 Indeed, it follows
Heidegger to such a remarkable degree that as Dominique Janicaud
says, it is not so much ‘a course on Heidegger, but a commentary on
a course by Heidegger’.27 It was delivered in the academic year before
Foucault began University studies, but Defert says that Foucault
attended what sounds like a similar course from October 1946.28
A very young Kostas Axelos, newly arrived from Greece, was there
for the earlier course, and recalls that Wahl ‘did not read a text
written in advance, and only consulted the notes he had with him
very occasionally’.29 It seems likely that Foucault attended Wahl’s
1950 course L’Idée d’être chez Heidegger, and possibly the December
1951 to March 1952 course La Pensée de Heidegger et la Poésie de
Hölderlin.30
While the dominant French reading of Heidegger in the late 1940s
and early 1950s focused on the texts available in translation, and
tended to read him through Sartrean and Kierkegaardian lenses,31
Wahl was able to provide a much richer interpretation. These courses
make extensive use of Heidegger’s writings after Being and Time, with
a special focus on the collection Holzwege. Holzwege was published
in 1950 and included texts from 1936–46, notably one on Nietzsche.

Wahl also discusses the ‘Letter on Humanism’, and there is a stress
on the development of Heidegger’s thought.32 He also draws on sec-
ondary literature, including Walter Biemel’s study of the world, and
makes extensive use of an article by Henri Birault, then forthcoming
in Revue de métaphysique et de morale, a journal Wahl edited.33
Foucault took notes on Biemel’s study, which also includes discussion
of unpublished material.34
Two further courses, on the history of metaphysics and philosophy
of existence were published in 1951.35 The first of these has a focus on
Heidegger’s short book that contained ‘Plato’s Doctrine of Truth’ and
the ‘Letter on Humanism’; along with Holzwege. Wahl immediately
translates Heidegger’s brief description of what a Holzwege is– a
wood path, but also a lost path.36 Wahl also discusses Heidegger’s
1924–5 course on Plato’s Sophist and the first lecture course on
Nietzsche from 1936–7 on The Will to Power as Art, unpublished
until 1992 and 1961, respectively.37 Foucault either attended this
course or had access to its notes.38 Wahl’s subsequent courses included
two at the Sorbonne published together as Traité de Métaphysique,
though these do not discuss Heidegger as much.39 One notable later
course by Wahl was on Introduction to Metaphysics, Heidegger’s
1935–6 lecture course, though not published in German until 1953.40
Wahl’s final course on Heidegger was Mots, mythes et réalité dans la
philosophie de Heidegger, published in 1961.41
Wahl’s access to unpublished material is significant. Beaufret recalls
that Alexandre Koyré took a copy of a Heidegger course to France in
1929.42 From Beaufret’s recollection of a passage in the manuscript, in
which Heidegger compared Dasein to Leibniz’s monad, this is likely
the same course Wahl mentions in his 1947 book Petite histoire de
l’existentialisme, in which he too discusses such a passage.43 Although
Beaufret’s recollection is not precise, it is likely they mean the summer
1928 course, immediately preceding the Einleitung, published in
German in 1978 and translated as The Metaphysical Foundations of
Logic. This course is a detailed engagement with Leibniz, and it does
have a passage that matches their recollection.44
It seems highly likely that Koyré brought more than one course to
Paris from his time in Germany in 1928 and 1929.45 While Koyré is
best known in English for his works in the history of science, including
From the Closed World to the Open Universe and The Astronomical
Revolution, he was also a significant thinker of the history of philos-
ophy.46 Koyré had long been an important figure in the introduction
of Heidegger’s ideas to France. Koyré and Wahl knew each other
well, and Koyré was instrumental in getting Wahl to the United States
in 1942, probably saving his life.47 After the war Wahl clearly had
access to other unpublished courses by Heidegger, including the one
on Nietzsche on which he lectured. Student transcripts circulated and
Foucault clearly had access to them too. Foucault’s engagement with
Heidegger will be fully discussed in Chapter 5.
Jean Hyppolite and the Diploma Thesis on Hegel

Hyppolite was best known for his work on Hegel. He was the trans-
lator of the Phenomenology of Spirit, and wrote important works
on that text, the Logic and the Philosophy of History.48 Of a slightly
earlier generation, Alexandre Kojève’s lectures had begun this
French engagement.49 The audience was extraordinary: Althusser,
Raymond Aron, Bataille, Blanchot, André Breton, Koyré, Lacan,
Henri Lefebvre, Emmanuel Lévinas, Merleau-Ponty, Sartre and many
others.50 Hyppolite himself apparently avoided the lectures ‘for fear
of being influenced’.51 As John Heckman puts it, ‘the course served
as an indispensable preparation for the renewal of serious interest
in Hegel after the Second World War. In large part it is fair to
say that Kojève created the reading public for Hyppolite’s trans-
lation and commentary.’52 Hyppolite also wrote studies on Marx’s
early, Hegelian, work,53 and his essays across the history of western
philosophy were collected into a wide-ranging collection two years
after his death.54 Foucault later recognizes how Wahl and Hyppolite
together had made possible a French engagement with Hegel, albeit
one that Foucault would attempt to free himself from with the aid of
Nietzsche, Bataille and Blanchot (DE#281 IV, 84; EW III, 246).
In 1965 Hyppolite took part in a televised discussion with, among
others, Canguilhem, Foucault, Paul Ricœur, Dina Dreyfus and Alain
Badiou.55 He died in 1968, and it was his chair at the Collège de
France to which Foucault was elected. There was a tribute session
organized at the ENS on 19 January 1969, at which both Canguilhem
and Foucault spoke.56 Foucault suggests that Logique et existence is
‘one of the great books of our time’ (DE#67 I, 785), and pays specific
attention to the course on the Phenomenology of Spirit which he
attended– in which he says the students heard not only the voice of
the professor, but also ‘something of the voice of Hegel, and perhaps
even the voice of philosophy itself’ (DE#67 I, 779). Foucault under-
scores that Hyppolite was not just an historian of philosophy, but
spoke of the ‘history of philosophical thought’ (DE#67 I, 780). The
next year, Foucault pays fulsome tribute to Hyppolite in his Collège
de France inaugural lecture in the History of Systems of Thought (OD
74–82/170–3), which seems to go beyond the standard honours to

his predecessor demanded by the occasion. Finally, Foucault led the
volume Hommage à Jean Hyppolite in 1971, to which he contrib-
uted his ‘Nietzsche, Genealogy, History’ essay, along with pieces by
Canguilhem, Laplanche and Michel Serres.57
Foucault’s diplôme d’études supérieures thesis (roughly equivalent
to a Master’s degree by research) under the direction of Hyppolite was
submitted in 1949. It was entitled ‘La Constitution d’un transcendan-
tal dans la Phénoménologie de l’esprit de Hegel [The Constitution of
a Transcendental in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit]’, but was long
thought lost.58 Even when Foucault’s papers were sold to the BNF in
2013 this thesis was not to be found: it appears that Foucault did not
keep a copy. However, his nephew, Henri-Paul Fruchaud, found it
in Foucault’s mother’s house. It is part of a collection of documents
relating to the 1940s and 1950s which Fruchaud donated to the BNF,
separate from the main Foucault Fonds. There are two typed copies
of the thesis, along with fragments of Foucault’s manuscript and
some typed summaries and plans, along with Annexes of references
and a bibliography. One of the typescripts is missing several pages,
but the other is almost complete and missing only pages 74 and 75.
Unfortunately these are also missing from the other version.59
Following a note on references and some ‘Preliminary Remarks’,
the thesis is divided into three. The first and second parts are in
three chapters; the third part in four. The structure is tied to three
questions:
1. What are the limits of the field of phenomenological exploration,

and to what criteria must the experience serving as a point of
departure for reflection respond?
2. At what point does this regressive exploration end, and what is
the limit of this transcendental domain in which experience is
constituted?
3. What are the relations of this transcendental world with the actu-
ality of the world of experience from which the reflection has
unfolded, and for which it must account?60
Foucault suggests that the first requires an ‘objective examination of

the work’; the second a ‘philosophical interpretation’; and the third a
‘critical reflection’.61 The parts are entitled ‘The Transcendental Field’,
‘The Transcendental Subject’ and ‘The Transcendental and History’.
In each Foucault outlines the views of Hegel’s predecessors, notably
Kant, Johann Gottfried von Herder, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, and
Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling, before showing how Hegel
resolves some of the problems.62 He also recognizes the historical

development of Hegel’s writings, seeing the Phenomenology of 1807
as a break from Hegel’s earlier writings, and leading to the work of
the Logic.63 The parts are followed by an eleven-page conclusion,
itself unpaginated and filed separately from the body of the text, with
the Annexes and Bibliography found in other folders.
Foucault’s argument is that we should not see The Phenomenology
of Spirit as an introduction to the Hegelian system or its first part, but
rather as an assessment of how a ‘system as the totality of knowledge
[savoir]’ could be conceived. Here Foucault is breaking with some of
the previous commentators, such as Hyppolite who has seen it as an
introduction to the Logic, or Wahl, who had conceptualized it as a
noumenology,64 as well as Hegel’s own description of it as ‘System of
Science First Part’ in its original title. Foucault suggests it has both
a negative, critical examination of previous failures to achieve this,
and a positive ‘analysis of moments which constitute the possibility
of absolute knowledge’. Essentially, this totality of knowledge ‘is
a transcendental “milieu” in which the constituent subject is the
ego or self [le moi], and the constitutive structure, the concept. The
transcendental unity is a “I know [Je sais]”.’65 Foucault sees the
transcendental subject in contrast to Kant’s ‘I think’ and Descartes’s
‘I am’, itself of course founded on the cogito.66 Thought in itself does
not found knowledge, but the positive role of the Phenomenology is
that it ‘reveals not knowledge itself, but the “element”, the milieu of
knowledge [savoir]’.67
In Foucault’s presentation, the dialectical basis to Hegel’s method
of transcendental investigation consists of two alternating principles.
One is a regressive procedure of going from the complex [composé] to
the simple; the other is a progressive procedure going from the simple
to the complex. The first step is a way of understanding ‘the unity of
the transcendental subject in absolute knowledge’; the second moves
from the naked perception of the object to the ‘consciousness of the
world’. It is the ‘constant correlation of these two steps that makes the
complex unity of the phenomenological method’.68 History is both an
element in the transcendental world, but also something which ‘must
be overcome [dépassé] by a more fundamental element’.69
Foucault argues that we should interrogate Hegel on his own
ground, asking him only questions that he asked himself, a process of
immanent engagement with his thought.70 He questions how:
Kant’s philosophy of the transcendental became, in history, a category

of thought, how, put otherwise, historicity constituted by the Kantian
transcendental became a constituent historicity in later philosophy.
When we pass from Kant, inventor of the transcendental, to his succes-

sors, we do not pass from one moment of history to another, we pass
from a world of effective historical experiences to a possible world of
historical experiences.71
Essentially we must ask Hegel how the ‘experience of a fact’ relates

to a category.72 As Foucault outlines, ‘far from being a tautology, the
fundamental definition of knowledge by the “I know” is the only
means of giving a reality and a transcendental sense to the “I think”’
of Kant’.73
The definition of the transcendental ego [Moi] comprises three

moments: the first consists in the substitution of a ‘I know’ for ‘I think’;
the second discovers that knowledge is at the same time knowledge
and constitution of a world of experiences; finally, this constitutive
principle is not an anonymous substance, it is an ‘I’ [moi] that is only
ever a relation to itself.74
Each of these moments is, for Hegel, ‘dialectically defined’ in relation

to earlier attempts to ‘discover the constitutive principle of experi-
ence’, in relation notably to Kant and Fichte. Foucault underscores
that Hegel does not dissociate these three moments, and that the
Phenomenology works on them at different levels. This leads Foucault
to ‘the question of the status of philosophy in relation to the transcen-
dental’, the theme of the longest part of his thesis.75 Foucault contends
that the whole of the Phenomenology demonstrates Hegel’s point of
the system of ethical life [Sittlichkeit] that language is the ‘instrument
of reason’.76
All this means that Foucault discusses the way in which Hegel
conceptualizes history, which he suggests is connected to another
sense of time, that of the ‘time of intuition, the immediate presence of
a concept’. For Hegel, the transcendental subject is the consciousness
that knows [connaît] it, ‘already present in all experiences’.77 Foucault
sees Hegel’s work as a fundamental challenge to the ‘empty history
of Kant, and the blind history of Herder’.78 In relation to historical
matter it makes it temporal; in ‘relation to historical knowledge it is
what prevents history from being seen as external to the becoming
that it thinks’.79 Therefore, ‘history can be defined as the totality of
experience’.80
The problem of the thesis is therefore to examine the relation
between the historical and the transcendental, of the conditions nec-
essary for there to be an historical experience. In this sense, the
conditions must already be established, even though they are histor-
ically constituted: a circular problem.81 Foucault notes that Hegel
transforms an historical question into a philosophical problem.82 He

suggests that the crucial issue for Hegel is the contrast between a
cyclical history, in which the totality is enclosed, and the possibility
of escaping from history, ‘because there is no history without a con-
sciousness that thinks it’, and ‘because history, for this consciousness,
has a signification which is not historical: it is religion’.83
The resolution for this, Foucault argues, is the ‘new phenomeno-
logical dimension’, that of ‘being-for-us [être-pour-nous]’, which is
not so much the unity of ‘being-in-itself’ and ‘being-for-itself’ as the
consciousness of the philosopher.84 The idea of the truth in itself is
problematic, insufficient, because it does not have a relation to a
conscience, and because, ‘thought by the philosopher, the in-itself
is no longer in-itself’. ‘Being-for-us’ avoids this problem, because
it ‘is a mediation and makes the in-itself effective’; and ‘far from
disappearing at the level of absolute knowledge, the for-us is what is
realized in its totality at the level of absolute knowledge’.85 Finally,
Foucault explores how being-for-us and being in history are related.
For Descartes, Kant and Fichte, in different ways, the thinker, the
object and truth are intertwined. With Hegel, the philosopher is able
to transcend this, because there is a transcendental subject, abso-
lute knowledge, which constitutes history, and with which they can
identify.86
Foucault devotes some space in his final chapter to the young Marx’s
critique of Hegel,87 but it is in the conclusion that the full stakes of
his engagement become clear.88 It reiterates some general themes, and
contextualizes the writing of the work in 1806 as a response to Kant
and Fichte.89 This context is entirely intellectual: Foucault does not
mention the famous connection to the Battle of Jena and Napoleon’s
entry into the town in October 1806, just as Hegel was completing
the work.90 Foucault suggests that the Phenomenology is ‘neither
preface nor part of the Hegelian system’; but that it is ‘the search for
what makes possible the totality of a system of thought that wants to
present itself as a science. It is the process that will allow a thought
to be systematic without contradiction.’91 Indeed, he claims that the
work as a whole ‘can be interpreted as a phenomenology of philos
ophical consciousness, as a description of this step towards integral
knowledge, if at least we can accept the interpretation of absolute
knowledge that we have attempted’.92
A brief discussion of Marx, and a contrast of Hegel with Husserl’s
Ideas in the conclusion,93 are the extent of his explicit engagement
with the literature after Hegel, though Foucault is clearly indebted
to Hyppolite’s interpretation. The debates with which Hegel was
involved are outlined, but for the most part this is an internal
examination of Hegel’s work, largely but not exclusively through

the Phenomenology. Foucault also makes reference to other works
by Hegel including the Logic, Elements of the Philosophy of Right
and the Encyclopaedia; his lecture courses;94 and the earlier writings
which predate the Phenomenology, including theological texts from
Hegel’s years in Berne and Frankfurt and writings from the Jena
period.95 Except for Hyppolite’s translation of the Phenomenology,
Foucault usually makes reference to the Leipzig edition of the
Sämtliche Werke, with some other references for early works.96
Secondary literature draws on a wide range in French, German and
English, notably including works by Hyppolite and Wahl,97 but also
studies by Georg Lukács, Karl Löwith and Benedetto Croce.98 For
phenomenology beyond Hegel himself, Foucault references Husserl’s
Logical Investigations, Cartesian Meditations, and Experience and
Judgment, as well as articles by Eugen Fink, Lévinas and Sartre.99
The reading is certainly extensive, though the referencing, at least
in the draft preserved in the files, is somewhat slapdash. References
are frequently incomplete or wrong; Kierkegaard’s name is misspelt
as Kierkegaared, Kojève as Kogève, Husserl’s Erfahrung und Urteil
as Erpatirung und Urteil, and even, astonishingly, his thesis director
twice misspelt as ‘Hippolite’. These errors indicate that another hand
was responsible for the typing of the text, and had to contend with
Foucault’s often difficult handwriting.
It is an apprentice work, certainly, and one that bears strong marks
of its supervisor. Among other things it is notable that Foucault does
not discuss the master/slave dialectic, central to Kojève’s reading of
the text, which was to become so influential following him. It is an
important moment in Foucault’s intellectual development, and an
astonishing piece of work for someone who was only twenty-two
when it was completed in June 1949.100 While Foucault does not
pursue the type of approach here in subsequent work, except perhaps
the introduction to Kant’s Anthropology, there are some similarities
to topics of later interest. In particular, the (contingent) nature of the
transcendental and its conditions of possibility are here always histor-
ical, something with which Foucault will continue to be concerned in
later work. Equally, the stress on the question of knowledge would be
central to his work of the 1960s, culminating in The Archaeology of
Knowledge, and continues into his work of the 1970s with the notion
of power-knowledge. The reading undertaken finds its most imme-
diate payoff in the lecture courses he would give in Paris and Lille in
the first half of the 1950s, discussed in Chapter 2. This is especially
so for the work on philosophical anthropology, which engages with
German thought in detail, but also for his interest in the development
of phenomenology in Husserl. However, the text is also notable for

the complete absence of reference to Heidegger and Nietzsche, two
key figures for his later intellectual development (see Chapter 5).101
Psychology
Alongside this work on philosophy, Foucault was also studying psy-
chology. Foucault’s formal teachers included Lagache, who established
the diploma in psychology at the Sorbonne and with Jacques Lacan
formed the breakaway Société française de psychanalyse in 1953.102
Lacan pays tribute to Lagache’s work in Écrits, devoting a whole
essay to him.103 Foucault also attended classes by the neurologist and
psychiatrist Ajuriaguerra who was in 1975 elected to a chair at the
Collège de France.104 Of course, not all the influences came from the
classroom: Foucault was a voracious reader too. Georges Politzer’s
1928 work, Critique of the Foundations of Psychology, was certainly
important.105 Politzer was a PCF theorist, executed by the Gestapo in
1942, who made one of the few PCF contributions to psychological
theory.106 In the early 1920s Politzer was one of the members of the
Philosophies group of whom Georges Friedmann, Norbert Guterman
and Lefebvre were also members.107 Politzer translated Friedrich
Schelling’s La Liberté humaine, to which Lefebvre contributed a long
introduction– one of his first major publications– in 1926.108 Politzer
is also known for La Crise de la psychologie contemporaine,109 and
was influential to Merleau-Ponty, Lacan and Laplanche.110
Politzer is critical of recent developments in psychology, with an
explicit focus on Freud and The Interpretation of Dreams. His key
innovation is to critique the distinction between manifest and latent
contents of mental life,111 and to propose what he calls ‘concrete
psychology’. For Politzer there is only one field of consciousness,
and he therefore is strongly critical of Freud’s turn to abstraction,
his metapsychology, especially in the light of his earlier promise of
a more concrete work. Metapsychology detached psychology from
empirical evidence, and Politzer is too much of a phenomenologist
for that to be valid. ‘Metapsychology has lived its life, and the history
of psychology is beginning.’112 Politzer is also critical of the scientific
pretensions of modern psychology: ‘We need to understand that psy-
chologists are scientists like evangelized wild tribes are Christian.’113
The Critique was intended to begin a three-volume study, Matériaux
pour la Critique des fondements de psychologie,114 with ‘another
volume on Gestalt theory, with a chapter on phenomenology’, and
a third on ‘behaviourism and its different forms with a chapter on
applied psychology’.115 While this work was cut short by his execu-
tion, it would be developed by many who followed his inspiration.
Politzer developed one approach to psychology, in contrast to
Ignace Meyerson’s more historical approach.116 Defert claims that
Foucault spent time with Meyerson from October 1951 (C 17/17; CH
40), which has been used to argue for the importance of Meyerson
for Foucault’s work.117 However, a letter from Foucault to Meyerson
from June 1953 requesting a first meeting challenges this chronol-
ogy.118 A more balanced approach to this relation to contemporary
currents in psychology can be found in the unpublished thesis of
Alessandro de Lima Francisco.119 In addition, Defert recounts that
Pierre Morichau-Beauchant, one of the first French psychoanalysts,
and a family friend of the Foucaults, gave Foucault his collection of
early psychoanalysis journals in October 1951, shortly before his
death and just as Foucault began teaching (C 17/17).
Another key figure in Foucault’s knowledge of psychology was
teaching outside the formal university system. While he was still
based in Paris, Foucault attended Lacan’s seminar, which was held
for two hours on Wednesdays from November to July.120 The seminar
began in 1951, initially in Lacan’s living room, before moving to the
Hôpital Sainte-Anne in late 1953. Lacan was fifty when the seminar
began, and there was a lot of clinical and theoretical experience
behind it. Lacan’s thesis On Paranoid Psychosis in Relationship to
Personality had been published in 1932, and there were other early
publications.121 Écrits begins with a text from 1936, but it is selected
writings, not a complete works. As Lacan’s son-in-law and seminar
editor, Jacques-Alain Miller, indicates, Lacan believed that his real
work began around the time his seminar teaching began: writings
before that were its ‘antecedents’.122 Hyppolite was an active partic-
ipant in the 1953–4 seminar.123 Miller notes that Hyppolite was a
regular attender, and ‘was quite open-minded at a time when other
French philosophers found Lacan too difficult to understand’.124
It is worth underlining that Lacan’s seminar was, until the 1960s,
simply advertised as ‘Commentaries on the texts of Freud’.125 Sigmund
Freud had died in 1939, and Lacan begins his seminars only twelve
years later. Part of Lacan’s explicit purpose was to return to Freud
himself, stripped of some of the intervening years of interpretation
and adaptation. As he comments: ‘The meaning [sens] of a return to
Freud is a return to Freud’s meaning [sens].’126 A crucial text was the
1953 Rome lecture ‘The Function and Field of Speech and Language
in Psychoanalysis’, which has been described as ‘for all practical pur-
poses the manifesto of the structuralist reinterpretation of Freud’.127
Miller notes that instead of a recording being made, or Lacan’s
notes being available for editing, the seminar sessions were recorded
in shorthand by a stenographer and then typed up. Copies were made
of this typescript, which circulated for several years before Miller
began the process of editing the seminars for publication.128 But the
stenographer only began work when the seminar moved to Sainte-
Anne. As a consequence, there are few traces of the first two years’
sessions, looking at Freud’s most famous case studies. In 1953 Lacan
indicates that the ‘Wolf Man’ was the focus in the first year (1951–2);
the ‘Rat Man’ in the second (1952–3).129 In the first year he also
discussed the Dora case, but no notes survive.130 Miller suggests that
‘Intervention on Transference’ in Écrits contains echoes of this year’s
discussion.131 In the second year Lacan discussed the ‘Wolf Man’ case
again, of which some notes are available.132 The opening lines of the
first session refer back to the Dora case. Unfortunately, no notes on
the ‘Rat Man’ discussion have been preserved. However, Lacan’s
Paris lecture ‘The Neurotic’s Individual Myth’, which was circulated
in unauthorized form from 1953, and finally published in 1978, may
draw on material first delivered in this seminar.133 Miller also suggests
that the Rome lecture reflects this work.134
For his 1953–4 seminar, Lacan discussed ‘Freud’s papers on tech-
nique’, and a partial transcript forms the first volume of the published
seminars.135 Unfortunately almost all of the 1953 material is lost,
with the published version really beginning with the 13 January 1954
session. Lacan utilized material from the seminar in some of his other
lectures and writings. ‘Variations on the Standard Treatment’ and
‘Introduction and Reply to Hyppolite’ stem directly from this seminar,
and were published in 1955 and 1956 but, as Miller has noted, texts
from several years later pick up and elaborate on themes discussed in
this class. He mentions two: ‘Remarks on Daniel Lagache’ in 1960,
and ‘The Mistaking of the Subject Supposed to Know’ from 1968.136
In 1954–5 the seminar topic was ‘The Ego in Freud’s Theory and
in the Technique of Psychoanalysis’.137 The two key texts read were
Freud’s ‘Beyond the Pleasure Principle’ and ‘The Ego and the Id’.138 In
these early years Lacan was therefore working through Freud’s texts
systematically– beginning with the case studies, moving to the papers
on technique, and then material on metapsychology. In 1955–6 he
turned to the psychoses, mainly through a reading of the case of Judge
Schreber.139
Maurice Pinguet notes that Foucault went every week to hear Lacan,
and a diary entry suggests this began in 1951.140 Pinguet was a friend
of Foucault from their days at the ENS, who moved to Japan in the
1950s (C 17/17; 22/24).141 He adds that Foucault also attended the
seminars when they moved to Sainte-Anne, and explicitly mentions
the theme of the papers on technique.142 While Lacan’s seminar con-

tinued, with some disruptions, and several changes of venue, until
shortly before his death, Foucault stopped attending when he went
to Uppsala in 1955 (DE#281 IV, 58; EW III, 258). The first two
published seminars, and the traces of the two previous years, are
therefore the most relevant for looking at the exposure Foucault had
to his ideas. It is notable that while Lacan regularly asks attendees to
comment or contribute to the seminar, Foucault is not called upon in
extant materials. Of course, at the time Foucault was only in his mid
to late twenties and hardly well known.
Foucault’s attendance from the beginning means that, in Macey’s
words, that he was ‘one of the first to bring to the rue d’Ulm news of
the ‘return to Freud’, or in other words of Lacan’s reformulation of
psychoanalytic principles in the light of modern linguistics, anthro-
pology and philosophy and of his dismissal of the ‘ego-psychology’
which, he claimed was reducing psychoanalysis to a ‘banal psycho-so-
cial engineering’.143 In particular, while his own work was informed
by Heidegger, Lacan took a clear distance from the existential psy-
chotherapy movement. This was not always the case. In 1932, not
long after completing his doctoral dissertation, Lacan sent an article
to Binswanger dedicated to him.144
While Foucault attended at least some sessions, and clearly read
some of Lacan’s work from quite early on, his attitude seems ambiv-
alent.145 Pinguet says that Foucault admired Lacan enormously, and
recalls a conversation around 1953 in which Foucault told him that
‘in psychoanalysis today it is only Lacan who is of importance!’146
Yet Macey interviewed Jacqueline Verdeaux for his biography, and
reports her view that Foucault ‘had little sympathy for Lacan’s over-
all project and poured scorn on his philosophical pretensions. The
psychoanalyst’s pilgrimage to see Heidegger in Freiburg in 1950
provoked great mirth on Foucault’s part, as well as some very dispar-
aging comments on Lacan’s philosophical competence in unpublished
letters to Verdeaux.’147 Her husband Georges Verdeaux had produced
a thesis under Lacan’s supervision in 1944.148 Nonetheless, Foucault
could be more positive, such as in the Binswanger introduction (DE#1
I, 73; DIE 37–8). In 1961, he said that while French psychoanalysis
had initially been ‘strictly orthodox’, more recently it had ‘taken on a
second and more prestigious life, due as you know, to Lacan’ (DE#5
I, 168; FL 8).
Foucault’s early publications have only limited relation to what
he heard in these seminars. Maladie mentale et personnalité was
completed in late 1953, and the Binswanger introduction over Easter
1954. As Chapter 4 will note, there is one indication in the intro-
duction of something he probably heard in a seminar; and Chapter

3 notes how Lacan may have influenced the reading of Freud in
Maladie mentale et personnalité. Foucault’s relation to Lacan will be
discussed further in The Archaeology of Foucault.
Yet perhaps the most significant early influence in psychology
comes from a figure who might be thought to play a more impor-
tant role in Foucault’s understanding of philosophy, Merleau-Ponty.
Merleau-Ponty had made his reputation with The Phenomenology
of Perception, his 1945 primary thesis.149 But Merleau-Ponty’s sec-
ondary thesis, The Structure of Behaviour [comportement] was
actually published first, in 1942, and was perhaps more significant for
Foucault.150 As the book begins, Merleau-Ponty states that his ‘goal
is to understand the relations between consciousness and nature:
organic, psychological or even social. By nature we understand here
a multiplicity of events external to each other and bound together
by relations of causality.’151 Yet Merleau-Ponty does not structure
his enquiry on the basis of a subject who perceives, but grounds it
on the basis of the psychological and biological research of the time.
However, his argument is that the Gestalt theorists did not fully
appreciate the consequences of their research. In demonstrating that
even the simplest experience was structured by an underlying form,
rather than learned, their work fundamentally challenged knowledge
and being. What is clear from both these early works is that scientific
research provides a rich resource for his enquiries. Biology and psy-
chology, especially, can be used to resource his philosophical enquiry.
While he does not use them as a foundational basis, nor does he share
Heidegger’s critical position that ‘no result of any science can ever be
applied immediately to philosophy’.152 In the Preface to the second
edition Alphonse de Waelhens explains Merleau-Ponty’s distance
from Heidegger: ‘But in Being and Time one does not find thirty lines
concerning the problem of perception; one does not find ten concern-
ing that of the body.’153 For Foucault, studying both psychology and
philosophy, the rich interrelation of these themes in Merleau-Ponty’s
work was clearly appealing.
In a wide-ranging 1978 interview with the Italian Marxist Duccio
Trombadori Foucault notes the Hegelian influence of Wahl and
Hyppolite, but suggests Merleau-Ponty was something more than
that. He was both ‘a meeting point between the academic philosoph-
ical tradition and phenomenology’, but also took this work into a
range of related fields, including ‘the intelligibility of the world, the
real’ (DE#281 IV, 48; EW III, 247). Later in the same interview he
expands: ‘A whole aspect of phenomenology took the form of an
interrogation of science, in its foundation, its rationality, its history.
The great texts of Edmund Husserl, of Alexandre Koyré, formed

the other face of phenomenology, opposite the more existential phe-
nomenology of the lived [le vécu]. . . In many respects, the work of
Merleau-Ponty was an attempt to recapture the two dimensions of
phenomenology’ (DE#281 IV, 53; EW III, 252). A few years earlier
he had told Mauriac of his ‘fascination’ with him.154
A wide range of Merleau-Ponty’s lecture courses are published,
some of which Foucault attended. Merleau-Ponty’s 1947–8 course
Malebranche, Biran and Bergson on the Union of Body and Soul was
delivered both at the University of Lyon and the ENS.155 The published
edition is based on the Paris lectures, using audience notes because the
original manuscript is missing. In the second edition, these notes are
compared to those from Lyon by Michel Jouhaud, which shows that
it was essentially the same course. Foucault attended in Paris, and
Jacques Taminiaux tells the story of being told about the course by a
friend, who said his own notes were ‘imprecise and not very legible’,
and suggested that he speak to Foucault instead. Taminiaux says that
Foucault ‘very graciously loaned me his notebook of lecture notes
which were indeed very clear and detailed’. Taminiaux says that the
notes were much read, but not copied by him, and so he was sorry
when Foucault asked to retrieve the notes, something he suggests
shows ‘how important and inspiring these lectures were for him’.156
Reading the course now it is hard to see what inspired Foucault
so much. The course was written to link three thinkers who were on
the curriculum for the agrégation that year. The topic of the body–
soul relation was one that Merleau-Ponty had discussed in both The
Structure of Behaviour and The Phenomenology of Perception and,
while he was bound by the constraints of the curriculum, he nonethe-
less puts plenty of himself into the material. One crucial theme is the
discussion of extension, and the critique of Descartes’s understanding
of space.157 This, as in Merleau-Ponty’s wider work, is challenged by
a corporeal spatiality.158 Foucault later recalls that it was in 1948 that
Merleau-Ponty began engaging with Ferdinand de Saussure’s work on
linguistics; a theme that continues into his later courses.159 Foucault’s
interest at this time was quite different from the History of Madness.
While that became his eventual doctoral thesis, his first, abandoned
thesis was on the philosophy of psychology (see Chapter 2).
Merleau-Ponty taught at the Sorbonne from 1949–52, as Professor
of Child Psychology and Pedagogy, succeeding Jean Piaget. Merleau-
Ponty’s eight courses there concentrated on themes within the remit
of his chair, from the consciousness and acquisition of language to
their relation to others and the adult’s view of the child. Only one
course was on a theme directly related to his better-known research
interests– ‘The Human Sciences and Phenomenology’. Student notes

from these lectures were transcribed, and approved by Merleau-Ponty
for publication. They appeared in the University of Paris’s Bulletin
de psychologie, and then in various collected editions.160 Foucault
references some of these in an unpublished manuscript on Merleau-
Ponty (see Chapter 4).161 Some of the courses were translated into
English in book form or in collections, before the definitive edition
was translated entire.162
Merleau-Ponty was elected to the Collège de France in 1952, where
he gave a sequence of courses on themes including the world, lan-
guage, speech, institution, passivity, nature, ontology and philosophy
today.163 These courses were brought to an abrupt end with his pre-
mature death at the age of fifty-three on 3 May 1961, just over two
weeks before Foucault’s thesis defence. For much of Merleau-Ponty’s
Collège de France career then, Foucault was outside France. Foucault
could have attended Merleau-Ponty’s earliest courses there, but there
is no indication that he did. In his inaugural course The Sensible World
and the World of Expression from 1953, Merleau-Ponty explores
ideas about space, time, the body and perception, which connect back
to his Sorbonne lectures, but also to Foucault’s own research interests
at the time.164 Merleau-Ponty shows how behavioural psychology and
Gestalt theory can provide empirical background for thinking about
fundamental questions of the relation of the subject and the world.
There can be no fixed division between material things in the sensible
world and cultural things of the world of expression.165
Through his years at the Sorbonne and Collège de France, Merleau-
Ponty published several other works, which tended to be works of
political theory or collections of essays on art and other themes,
rather than major philosophical works like his first two books. These
later books include Humanism and Terror and Adventures of the
Dialectic, and Sense and Non-Sense and Signs. Two incomplete
manuscripts were published posthumously: The Prose of the World
and The Visible and the Invisible.166 Many assessments of Foucault
and Merleau-Ponty concentrate on the books, and draw contrasts
between a thinker in the phenomenological tradition, and one who
sought to move beyond it.167 Indeed, Foucault sometimes uncritically
groups Merleau-Ponty with Sartre as representatives of a tradition
from which he wished to disassociate himself (i.e. DE#55 I, 662;
FL 55; DE#109 II, 372; FL 98; DE#361 IV, 764; EW II, 467). But
Merleau-Ponty’s lectures bridging psychology and philosophy are
arguably more significant for Foucault’s early development.
Louis Althusser, Georges Canguilhem and the Agrégation

After the education in philosophy and psychology, the next stage of
Foucault’s training was the extensive study required for the agrégation
de philosophie, which would allow him to teach. It was through this
examination that Foucault became close to Althusser and had his first
significant encounter with Canguilhem. Althusser passed the agréga-
tion himself in 1948, coming first on the written part and second on
the oral, and immediately began teaching at the ENS.168 Althusser
took the role of agrégé-répétiteur, a director of studies or ‘caïman’ in
ENS-slang. As Alan Schrift notes, the meaning of caïman is contested,
referring either to the Cayman Islands or a species of alligator used
as a nickname for a cruel instructor.169 At the time Althusser was
relatively unknown, and his major works all appeared some years
later. Foucault attended some of Althusser’s courses, including one on
‘Le Droit’,170 which seems to be an earlier iteration of the work that
informed Althusser’s short book on Montesquieu in 1959 and his
courses on the history of political thought.171 Yet Althusser’s influence
on Foucault was most significant in the training classes for the agré-
gation. Like many of his students, Foucault joined the PCF under his
influence too (DE#281 IV, 50–1; EW III, 249–50).172
The agrégation comprised three written papers, usually scheduled
for 8am to 3pm, on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday in a single
week in the summer. The first two papers were on general themes
in philosophy; the third was an historical one. These texts were then
marked by two examiners, and between 1 in 4 and 1 in 6 students
passed– a dmissibles. If they passed the written part, a couple of
weeks later the candidate would then attend an oral exam where they
had to speak on a topic chosen by lot from a number of potential
themes, followed by another extemporized leçon (a grande and petite
leçon) and commentaries on texts in modern and classical languages.
For the leçon they were given six hours research time in the Sorbonne
library, then had to present a fifty-minute lecture to the jury. The
explication de texte required one French, one Latin, and one Greek,
the last of which could be replaced by an English or German text. It
was the language of the text on the programme, sometimes in transla-
tion, which was significant here. For the explication they were given
one-hour’s preparation time and had to present for thirty minutes.173
The students had some prior knowledge of the thinkers and themes
to be studied, with the programme announced the year before, and
about half the curriculum changing each year. For 1950, the authors
set for the written part were Plato, David Hume, Kant, and Auguste
Comte, with a range of specific texts for the oral– o nes by Plato,
Aristotle, Cicero, Seneca, Leibniz, Descartes, Comte, Jules Lachelier,
Psychologie et Métaphysique; Émile Boutroux, L’Idée de loi natur-
elle; Léon Brunschvicq, Les Ages d’intelligence. For candidates not
working with Greek, those texts could be replaced either by the
first book of Kant’s Critique of Practical Reason and the third of
Schopenhauer’s The World as Will and Representation, or Berkeley’s
Three Dialogues and the first three books of Hume’s A Treatise of
Human Nature.174 For 1951 the main authors were Plotinus, Spinoza,
Hume, Comte and Bergson. For the written part, the texts were by
Plato, Plotinus, Cicero, Seneca, Spinoza, Descartes and Brunschvicq,
along with French translations of Kant and Hegel. For those not
taking Greek, there were texts from Kant, Schopenhauer, Berkeley
and Hume.175 Clearly an unsuccessful candidate in one year already
had a head start for the next, although the curriculum was still formi-
dable. The written parts in 1950 were on the notion of personality;
affective memory; and the positivist spirit of Comte;176 and in 1951
on experience and theory, perceptual activity and intelligence, and a
supposed dialogue between Bergson and Spinoza on the themes of
time and eternity.177
The topics chosen for the agrégation are significant, leading to
the specialized and sustained study of entire bodies of work by stu-
dents, as well as the publication of studies on the thinkers chosen by
academics.178 These processes, as Schrift has discussed, thereby help
to cement and shape a canon.179 At the ENS, Althusser was the key
person preparing students for the examination, and as well as his
teaching, he would take students away to the Royaumont abbey just
north of Paris in the first half of July for intensive preparations.180
The president of the agrégation jury was Canguilhem. This was
part of his role as Inspector General of philosophy in the French
higher education system 1948–55. This was a period when he did not
give his own courses.181 Before this Canguilhem taught at Strasbourg
and, while he succeeded Gaston Bachelard at the Sorbonne, he only
moved there in November 1955, by which time Foucault was already
in Uppsala. This helps to set some of the claims of the relation in
context. It is sometimes said that Canguilhem was Foucault’s teacher
in the 1950s, supervisor of his doctoral thesis on madness, and that
Bachelard’s influence on Foucault comes through him.182 None of
these things are straightforwardly true. There is no evidence that
Foucault attended any courses: Canguilhem was not teaching when
Foucault was in Paris, and the files at the BNF do not contain any
notes.
Bachelard is well known as a philosopher and historian of science,
whose work on mathematics and physics set agendas and stand-

ards for French studies in epistemology. Cavaillès and Canguilhem
were two key figures who followed his lead. Canguilhem’s doctoral
thesis on the concept of the reflex was supervised by Bachelard and
published in 1955.183 The Bachelard–Canguilhem–Foucault lineage
has been widely discussed, including by Foucault himself,184 though
there is a danger of reducing all three under the rubric of a ‘historical
epistemology’. There are undoubtedly connections, and as Macey has
suggested, ‘the notion of the history of a discourse pronouncing upon
its validity. . . locates Foucault’s history of psychology firmly within
an epistemological tradition within the history of science’– of which
Canguilhem is a key figure.185 However the causal link has become a
critical commonplace. Through Jacqueline Verdeaux, Foucault knew
Bachelard in person well before he wrote the History of Madness
(see Chapter 4). His interest in Bachelard’s work was not just in the
philosophy of science, of which Canguilhem was an obvious continu-
ation, but also his work on the elements and poetics, which connected
to a rather different strand of French thought.
Indeed, while Foucault certainly found Canguilhem’s work of
interest, it is not clear how well he knew it, and at what time. In 1978
Foucault notes that Bachelard was not his teacher, but that he read
his books, and that much later Canguilhem became a key influence
(DE#281 IV, 56; EW III, 255–6). Foucault knew On the Normal and
the Pathological in the 1950s, as it is mentioned in a draft of Maladie
mentale et personnalité, and there are notes on it filed with materials
on psychology and biology from that period.186 However his more
detailed engagement seems to have come later. In 1965 Foucault tells
Canguilhem that ten years before, when he began work, he barely
knew his books.187 In addition, the relation was far from one way:
Foucault’s History of Madness and Birth of the Clinic were important
for the reshaping of On the Normal and Pathological in 1966.188 The
original version had been Canguilhem’s thesis for his doctorate in
medicine in 1943, submitted to the University of Strasbourg, which
was then in exile in Clermont-Ferrand due to the Nazi occupation.
It was reissued in 1950, and then with new material in 1966.189 This
was by far the best known of his books. Foucault references the 1952
collection Knowledge of Life in The Order of Things,190 and La
Formation du concept de réflexe in The Archaeology of Knowledge.191
While many individual essays appeared beforehand, Canguilhem’s
two important collections of studies on the history and philosophy of
sciences did not appear until 1968 and 1977.192 The thesis story will
be discussed in Chapters 7 and 8.
Though Foucault and Canguilhem met in 1945 for the entrance
to the ENS, the first significant encounter was in the early 1950s
for the agrégation.193 Some traces of Foucault’s practice work are
preserved in Althusser’s papers at IMEC. Althusser kept his notes
on student practice presentations, with his grades written on top.
Foucault scored consistently highly on these, usually between 13 and
15 out of 20, better than most other students whose marks have been
preserved. For one on destiny Althusser suggested it was worth 15
or 16; for another on virtue 16 or 17. Another on science mentioned
Cavaillès and Trofim Lysenko, and Althusser suggested it was worth
15.194 But Althusser also cautioned him to take care, not to be too
obscure for the jury, to avoid ‘dangerous’ vocabulary, and wordplay.
He suggested one text on science and philosophy would score 17–18,
or 13–14, depending on whether the jury read it twice or once. The
text was ‘too rich’ and some elliptical thoughts risked being seen as
‘ignorance’.195
Foucault failed the agrégation in 1950, to general surprise.196
Candidates could be eliminated at each stage, and it was the first
oral examination, on hypotheses in science, which Foucault failed,
scoring just 9 out of 20.197 The sociologist Georges Davy reported
that Foucault had tried to display his knowledge rather than answer-
ing the question, discussing Parmenides and not Claude Bernard.198
Among the candidates who beat him were Pierre Aubenque, Jean-
Pierre Faye, Jean-François Lyotard and Jean Laplanche.199 Althusser’s
students usually did well, with five each passing in 1950 and 1951,
but nonetheless the failures led to rumours of a bias against com-
munists. The agrégation was strongly criticized in the PCF journal
La Nouvelle Critique in 1951, in an article signed by Jean Néry, but
which some thought the editor Kanapa himself may have written.
‘Néry’ was actually Althusser’s student Michel Verret, who passed on
his second attempt in 1953.200
Foucault’s failure seems to have led to a major depressive episode,
including a spell in an institution, where Althusser helped him to
get better treatment and housing.201 However, he did spend three
weeks in Göttingen in August 1950, at the Fridtjof Nansen Haus as
part of an international study programme.202 He returned to study
at the ENS, and retook the agrégation in 1951. The jury included
Hyppolite, Davy, and Canguilhem again served as president. This
time Foucault drew ‘sexuality’ for the first oral component, added
to the list by Canguilhem. After the event, Foucault formally com-
plained, apparently outraged by this unsuitable topic, ironically so,
given his own extensive work on the theme in his later career.203 Like
Verret, Foucault passed the agrégation on this second attempt, placed
second in the philosophy cohort.204
2
Teaching at Lille and the
École Normale Supérieure
Having passed the agrégation, the usual route for a French academic
was teaching in a lycée, before a university post. Instead, Foucault
applied to the Fondation Thiers, a residential research centre in
the north of Paris. Foucault had discussed this with Canguilhem as
Inspector General,1 and visited Georges Duhamel of the Académie
française to submit his candidacy on 31 May 1951.2 He was awarded
a three-year fellowship and in the 1951–2 academic year began work
on what was intended to be his doctoral thesis, under the supervision
of Henri Gouhier, on the broad area of the philosophy of psychol-
ogy.3 The director Paul Mazon was his second sponsor [parrain]
and reported to the Fondation at the end of the year that Foucault’s
planned two theses were on ‘the problem of the human sciences in
the post-Cartesians’ and ‘the notion of culture in contemporary psy-
chology’. Mazon adds that the first seemed ‘particularly interesting
to him’, with its examination of how ‘Cartesian thought developed
through foreign influences, Italian and Dutch’ and how this then
led to the work of Malebranche and Bayle.4 Foucault’s interest in
these topics was a direct link back to Merleau-Ponty’s lectures on
Malebranche and Maine de Biran, and indeed Gouhier told Eribon
that the secondary thesis would be on ‘Malebranche psychologist’.5
From October 1952 until June 1955, Foucault took up a position
as assistant in psychology at the faculty of letters at the University
of Lille.6 Although Foucault passed the agrégation in philosophy, he
taught psychology, a subject with which he had a long and compli-
cated relation.7 Not all academic subjects had an agrégation, so this
was not uncommon. Defert and Bourdieu, for example, both passed in
Teaching at Lille and the École Normale Supérieure 29
philosophy before going on to teach sociology. Mazon knew the Lille

appointment would likely limit work on this thesis, and Foucault did
not complete this planned research, leaving the Fondation after the
first year.8 Philippe Sabot notes that there are relatively few sources of
information about Foucault’s time in Lille,9 though Foucault’s friend
Jean-Paul Aron taught at a lycée in Lille in this period, and he gives
some details.10 Although the teaching role was in psychology, it was
based in a small philosophy department. There were three existing
professors, Raymond Polin, Olivier Lacombe and Yvon Belval, but
they did not want to teach psychology to their students, despite the
demand for it.11 With his background in both disciplines Foucault
was therefore well suited to the role.12 Foucault also complains that
at the time even the doctors who taught psychology did not teach
psychoanalysis.13 As part of his role, Foucault directed the Institut de
psychologie at Lille, which meant he had responsibility for organizing
teaching beyond his own.14
Defert, based on an account by Canguilhem, suggests Foucault’s
introduction to Lille was through André Ombredane, who wanted
someone to join the department with competence in ‘experimental
psychology’ (C 18/18). Although Ombredane was not at Lille, he was
a professor of psychology at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, only a
short distance away, and seems to have been a key figure in intellec-
tual circles in the area. He was agrégé in philosophy, had a doctorate
in medicine on mental disorders of people with multiple sclerosis,
and a doctorate in letters.15 He plays another role in Foucault’s story
as a mentor to Jacqueline Verdeaux (see Chapter 4). Eribon and
Macey suggest Foucault was recommended to the department by
Jules Vuillemin, a professor of philosophy and a friend and colleague
of Althusser from the ENS.16 Vuillemin taught at the University of
Clermont-Ferrand, and in 1960 Foucault would join him there (see
Chapter 8).
At Lille Foucault taught both contemporary psychology and its
history, psychoanalysis, psychopathology, and included some of his
own interests such as Gestalt theory, Ivan Petrovich Pavlov and other
Soviet work, Rorschach tests, and the existential psychotherapy of
Roland Kuhn and Binswanger.17 He was given a lot of freedom in
his teaching, being asked by Polin what he planned to cover and
only minor things were questioned.18 Foucault was therefore able to
use his own knowledge from his studies, and to develop new courses
over time as these changed. Gilles Deleuze attended a session in Lille,
through a recommendation of Jean-Pierre Bamberger, and recalls the
lecture as being ‘very clearly Marxist in orientation’.19 While Eribon
reports that there were some tensions between Foucault and his
30 Teaching at Lille and the École Normale Supérieure
more senior colleagues, the Dean assessed his work very favourably
in April 1954: ‘Young, extremely dynamic lecturer. Organized the
teaching of scientific psychology in a talented manner. Truly deserves
promotion.’20
During his year at the Fondation, and until spring 1955 while at
Lille, Foucault also taught at the ENS. Several of his courses were
repeated between institutions. Althusser had asked Foucault to take
on this position as répétiteur [tutor] of psychology at the ENS as soon
as he had passed his agrégation in 1951.21 The joke was that while it
was undoubtedly difficult to enter the ENS, it was almost impossible
to leave.22 (Although, the previous year, anticipating Foucault would
pass that summer, Althusser had written on Foucault’s behalf to the
University of Besançon, to try to get him a post there.)23 Althusser’s
biographer Yann Moulier Boutang specifies that Foucault began a
course at the ENS on 9 January 1952 on psychology, both on exper-
imental work, including Pavlov’s experiments, and psychoanalytic
work on personality.24
Foucault’s lectures were held on Monday evenings in the small Salle
Cavaillès on the rue d’Ulm, and were attended by Bourdieu, Derrida,
Gérard Genette, Jacques Lagrange, Jean Molino, Passeron, Maurice
Pinguet, Gérard Simon and Paul Veyne, among others. It is reported
that he regularly had an audience of fifteen to twenty-five, when
classes usually were in single figures.25 Macey adds that Foucault also
gave some classes in philosophy: ‘Veyne, for example, recalls a daz-
zling lecture on Descartes but, unfortunately, nothing of its content.’26
He also remembers the closing line of another lecture: ‘In reality, the
ontological argument for the existence of God serves as a theological
foundation for the essence of world.’ 27
Veyne told Eribon that ‘his course was famous. It was like going to
a show’; Derrida that ‘I was struck, like many others, by his speaking
ability. His eloquence, authority and brilliance were impressive.’28
Derrida also remembers that he wrote an essay on time:
Althusser said to me: ‘I can’t grade this. It’s too difficult, too obscure
for the agrégation. It might be very dangerous. But since I don’t feel I
can evaluate it, I’ll ask Foucault’s opinion . . .’ So he read this paper
and told me: ‘Well it’s either an F or an A+.’29
A copy of Derrida’s own first book publication– h is translation and

introduction of Husserl’s Origin of Geometry– was given to Foucault
with the dedication ‘To tell him my admiration and friendship, and
how much I expect from his indulgence.’30 Foucault responded by
letter, praising the work highly, for confirming his sense that Derrida
was ‘a perfect connoisseur of Husserl’, but also for ‘bringing out quite
different possibilities of philosophizing which phenomenology never
ceased to promise but also perhaps sterilized’. Foucault adds that the
first task of philosophy is reading, la Lecture, and that Derrida has
achieved that.31 Derrida later described himself as having had the
‘good fortune’ to have been taught by him, and that he retained ‘the
consciousness of an admiring and grateful disciple’.32
In the summer of 1952 Foucault also studied for a psychopathol-
ogy diploma at the Institut de psychologie de Paris.33 This was a
course which involved both theory and practice, taught by Jean Delay
and Maurice Benassy as well as sessions at the Sainte-Anne hospi-
tal.34 Foucault also took his ENS students to Sainte-Anne to observe
patient–doctor sessions.35 Defert adds that he gained a third certifi-
cate, in experimental psychology, from the Institut in 1953 (C 19/19).
Joel Whitebook suggests that this meant Foucault ‘possessed all the
credentials necessary to become either an academic psychologist or a
practising clinician’.36 To a degree, for the next three years Foucault
combined both– t eaching and working in two clinical settings. Foucault
continued to live in Paris for these years, sharing a flat with his brother
at 59 rue Monge. The flat was walking distance from the ENS, and he
commuted to Lille once a week, staying at a hotel near the station.37
He was therefore what the French call a ‘turbo-prof’, something he
would also be in his post at Clermont-Ferrand in the 1960s. Like many
French professors, Foucault required access to the research facilities in
Paris, but he also preferred to live in the city for personal and cultural
reasons.38 For example Foucault saw Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for
Godot in January 1953 in Paris. As he later recalls, it had a profound
impact on him (DE#343 IV, 608; DL–/176).39
The sources for Foucault’s teaching in this period are multiple but
incomplete. There are three substantial manuscripts preserved at the
BNF: ‘Connaissance de l’homme et réflexion transcendantale’, an
untitled one on Binswanger and ‘Phénoménologie et psychologie’.
While all relate to teaching in Lille, Foucault repeated some of the
material, both in Lille and at the ENS. With the first, at least part
of the version preserved dates from later than its first delivery. With
the others, while they may have their origins in courses, the versions
preserved are much more developed manuscripts whose possible pur-
poses are discussed below. All are handwritten, and to make things
more confusing, not all pages are numbered. There are other mate-
rials, and some student notes from Lagrange at IMEC and Simon
at CAPHÉS, which both relate to teaching at the ENS.40 There are
many open questions and inconsistencies, particularly concerning
dating, between these different sources and accounts from Defert and
the biographies. I will first discuss the three substantial manuscripts,

and then the more fragmentary materials, in order to reconstruct
Foucault’s teaching and associated writing in this period.
‘Connaissance de l’homme et réflexion transcendantale’

This is a manuscript of densely handwritten pages, numbered 1–97
on the recto only.41 Foucault’s notes are more fully developed than
his Collège de France courses, though not always in fully formed
sentences. It is not clear where lectures would end, though there is
quite a lot of subdivision using upper-case letters, roman numerals
and Greek letters. Foucault might have intended that this course
manuscript was more than simply lecture material. The manuscript
is preserved in a folder Foucault entitled ‘Cours 1952–3’. The text
begins with the designation ‘Chap I. Connaissance de l’h et réflexion
transcle’. Defert thinks the course was taught in 1953–4 (C 19/20),
and Foucault certainly gave a related course at the ENS in 1954–5.
Lagrange kept notes from a course entitled ‘Problèmes de l’anthro-
pologie’,42 and Simon has notes for lectures entitled ‘Cours d’histoire
de l’anthropologie’.43 Despite the different titles the shared content
indicates this was the same course, which followed a similar structure
and content to the surviving manuscript.44
Foucault’s focus on knowledge and transcendental reflexion might
be misleading. Although it certainly does connect to those themes,
links back to the Hegel thesis of 1949, and connects to some of his
concerns in 1950s publications on alienation and mental illness, the
focus is rather different. Right from the start it is clear that he is
concerned with what might be called philosophical anthropology.
He suggests that the word ‘anthropology’ is used in 1772 by Ernst
Platner in Anthropologie für Ärtze und Weltweise;45 the same year
that Kant began his course on anthropology. He also makes reference
on the very first page to Johann Friedrich Blumenbach, Hegel, Maine
de Biran, Ludwig Feuerbach, Fichte, the naturalist Paul Broca, and
the theological work of Heinrich Wichart, and General von Rudloff.46
Seeing Hegel as a contribution to philosophical anthropology was a
perspective familiar to those who had followed Kojève’s lectures.47
But the course is not entirely tied to the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries, since he refers his students to the early twentieth-century
phenomenology of Husserl and Max Scheler, especially the latter’s
studies of the human, including a recently translated book.48 Foucault
ends this initial survey with reference to a range of authors who had
taken up the theme of reflection on man in the most contemporary
period, from theologians such as Emil Brunner and philosophers and

psychologists including Wilhelm Keller and Binswanger.49 Almost all
of his references are to German texts, few of which were translated
at the time. Kant’s Anthropology did exist in a nineteenth-century
edition, long out-of-print, before being retranslated by Foucault.
The first part of the course is on anthropology in classical philos-
ophy. Here, despite some discussion of the theme, he finds a general
neglect. Foucault suggests that even though there were texts on the
human by Descartes or Claude Adrien Helvétius, ‘the autonomy of
the anthropological idea’ was not defined by classical philosophy.50
He suggests three reasons: following the neurologist Erwin Strauss,
dualism; following Feuerbach, the dominance of the theological
approach; and the privilege accorded to forms of abstract and a
priori rationality, a point he owes to Keller.51 But, he suggests, ‘in
fact the real obstacles are elsewhere’.52 This part of the course is
filled with references to Leibniz, especially the Theodicy, Spinoza,
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing’s The Education of the Human Race,
Malebranche and others, especially and extensively to Descartes. As
well as better-known texts he discusses the Optics and his letter to
Père Mesland.53 He discusses the state of nature and the myth of
Adam and the city of God.54 There is a clear sense of a comprehensive
survey for students.
However, this material on the early modern period, and further back
to the Greeks, seems to be intended as a prelude to the second part of
the course, on the Enlightenment and, especially, Kant. Foucault puts
Kant’s lectures on anthropology in relation to his critical project as
a whole, especially on the metaphysics of morals, but also the work
on pure reason.55 He connects this to Kant’s famous questions: ‘What
can I know? What should I do? What can I hope for?’ The first is a
theoretical question, the second practical, the third both. They help to
structure the organization of the three Critiques. To these questions,
a fourth is added in the Lectures on Logic: ‘What is man?’ or ‘the
human?’ In the Logic Kant explains: ‘The first question is answered
in metaphysics, the second in morals, the third in religion, the fourth
in anthropology.’56 As Foucault comments:
The dual relation of critical thought and anthropology in Kant opens

a certain number of possibilities and sketches multiple routes by which
we can define the relations between reflection on the foundations of
knowledge and the anthropological analysis of man.57
From here he moves to the nineteenth century, with analysis of Hegel,

Feuerbach, a little on Marx, and Wilhelm Dilthey.58 Themes include
human nature, religion and alienation– both in Hegel and Marx,

life and human reality [réalité humain]– the latter a contemporary
French translation of the notion of Dasein, particularly by Henry
Corbin (see Chapter 4).59
The course notes preserved at the BNF have a section marked as
‘Conclusion’,60 but there are several more pages of material after
this, on ‘The End of Anthropology’. This is predominantly a read-
ing of Nietzsche, and indeed there is an unnumbered page inserted
which gives an outline of material, headed by a quote from Beyond
Good and Evil §39, and with subdivisions on Dionysus, Becoming
and Will.61 In this section, themes include the relation of biology to
psychology, and the critiques of psychologism, truth, religion and
universal history. Texts by Nietzsche discussed include Daybreak,
The Gay Science, Beyond Good and Evil and The Will to Power.
Simon’s few pages of notes on a ‘Cours sur Nietzsche’ also seem to
relate to this material on anthropology, and relate to the last part
of Lagrange’s notes.62 Foucault discussed Twilight of the Idols, The
Birth of Tragedy, Daybreak §345 on happiness, and some of the
unpublished notebooks from the early 1880s. The key theme was
truth. What appears to be a separate lecture on Nietzsche concentrates
on The Birth of Tragedy, with mention of Beyond Good and Evil.
The final part of the material indicates five contemporary interpre-
tations, by Karl Jaspers, Heidegger, Karl Löwith, Walter Kaufmann
and Vuillemin, though the manuscript ends with Heidegger and the
student notes break off after a little detail on Jaspers.63
While Heidegger’s two-volume book on Nietzsche did not appear
until 1961, two pieces drawing on its themes were published
in Holzwege in 1950 and Vorträge und Aufsätze in 1954.64 The
former was the essay ‘Nietzsche’s Word: “God is Dead”’, which
informs the final section of Foucault’s manuscript entitled ‘The Death
of God’.65 The latter was ‘Who is Nietzsche’s Zarathustra?’ which
Foucault explicitly references, along with the essay ‘Overcoming
Metaphysics’.66 The 1961 book published abbreviated versions of
lectures from the late 1930s and 1940s, as well as some other texts.
As Chapter 1 discussed, Foucault had access to some student notes
from Heidegger’s courses. There are extensive notes from the 1950s
on Heidegger archived in Paris, which will be discussed in detail in
Chapter 5.67
In this course manuscript on anthropology, Heidegger is important
for Foucault not just as a reader of Nietzsche– also found in the dis-
cussion of the second Untimely Meditation in Being and Time68 – but
also as a thinker in his own right, with works up to Was heißt Denken/
What is Called Thinking? discussed. Foucault also mentions one of
the early secondary books on Heidegger, Karl Löwith’s Heidegger:

Denker in Dürftiger Zeit [Heidegger: Thinker in a Destitute Time]
which appeared in 1953.69 Indeed, while Löwith wrote a book on
Nietzsche’s eternal return, on which Foucault took extensive notes,
Denker in Dürftiger Zeit contains a chapter on Heidegger’s reading
of Nietzsche’s death of God, and this seems to be Foucault’s key
initial reference.70 With Kaufmann, the reference is his 1950 book
Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist. Vuillemin’s 1951
article in Les Temps modernes surveys contemporary interpretations,
treating Jaspers, Heidegger, Kaufmann and Löwith.71
It seems likely that Foucault reused the manuscript of the course
for later delivery. Many elements do date from Lille but because
Foucault reused the notes in Paris this raises the question of how
much additional, or replacement, material is here. As Chapter 5 will
discuss in detail, there is good evidence that Foucault’s key encounter
with Nietzsche only began in 1953. It therefore seems that ‘The
End of Anthropology’ section was not present when the course was
first delivered in Lille, but was a later addition from the ENS in
1954–5. Small clues further help with the dating. Heidegger’s Was
heißt Denken? was a course delivered between 1951 and 1952, and a
standalone lecture was given in May 1952, while ‘Who Is Nietzsche’s
Zarathustra?’ was a lecture delivered on 8 May 1953. The course
and the Nietzsche lecture both were first published in 1954; the Was
heißt Denken? lecture in 1952.72 ‘Overcoming Metaphysics’ was also
first published in 1954 in Vorträge und Aufsätze (GA7, 67–98). It
also seems that Foucault used Heidegger’s Kant and the Problem of
Metaphysics, published in 1929 and translated into French in 1953,
in earlier parts of the course.73 What is important is that Nietzsche is
seen as the end point of a longer tradition, giving the conditions for its
overcoming, and that Kant is a key figure in that tradition. The Kant
he privileges is historical and empirical, investigating the question
of the human through anthropology: a critical not transcendental
Kant.74 This introduction to Nietzsche and his impact on Foucault’s
work, especially in relation to Heidegger, will be discussed in more
detail in Chapter 5; his work on Kant’s Anthropology in Chapter 7.
The Binswanger Manuscript

An untitled manuscript on Binswanger is written out in detail, but is
unpaginated, and has a lot of crossings out, passages rewritten, and
some lines written vertically in the margins.75 The text has some foot-
notes, giving references to the texts discussed, though these are not
complete. There are some breaks, which suggest material is missing.

It is also undated, but Defert suggests that it is from c. 1952, given
the scrap paper used for some of the pages of the manuscript.76 These
pages are spirit duplicator copies of an appeal for people to attend a
meeting at the ENS to learn more about the case of a trade-union offi-
cial arrested in 1952.77 The appeal was signed by Foucault, Beaufret
and Althusser, among others. The meeting was to be held on 17
November 1952, and the appeal makes reference to an article in Le
Monde on 8 November 1952.78 This indicates that these pages cannot
have been written before that date. They appear towards the end of
the manuscript, which means that a date in the 1952–3 academic
year is certainly possible. However, both Sabot and Basso suggest
that it was first delivered as a course in 1953–4.79 Yet the way the
manuscript is written makes it unlikely to have been simply a course,
even if it had its genesis in teaching.
Binswanger directed the Bellevue Sanatorium in Kreuzlingen,
Switzerland, only metres from the border with Germany. The san-
atorium had been founded by Binswanger’s grandfather, also called
Ludwig, who was succeeded as director by his son Robert, and then
by grandson Ludwig in 1910.80 This was not the end of the family
business– the younger Ludwig’s uncle Otto, a professor of psychiatry
at the University of Jena, had treated Nietzsche. Ludwig had studied
with Bleuler, Freud, Carl Jung and Jaspers. Bleuler coined the term
‘schizophrenia’; Jakob Wyrsch had been his assistant; Binswanger’s
colleague Roland Kuhn was an advocate of his work.81 Schizophrenia
was one of Binswanger’s key interests, with four major studies pub-
lished on the topic.82 The younger Binswanger’s patients also included
the art-historian and librarian Aby Warburg83 and, extraordinarily,
given the Foucault connection, the novelist Roussel, but Élisabeth
Roudinesco notes that ‘the case history he assembled of his patient
has not survived’.84
Binswanger’s earliest writings show the profound influence
of Freud on his thinking, and his philosophical engagement with
German thought.85 He kept up a correspondence with Freud that
lasted from 1908 until 1938, just before Freud’s death the following
year.86 Binswanger was well versed in philosophical debates, espe-
cially neo-Kantianism, even before his encounter with Heidegger.87
Yet it was Heidegger who would shape his work most profoundly.
He read and corresponded with him from 1928, they met in 1929,
and kept in contact until Binswanger’s death in 1966.88 The result-
ing development of psychoanalysis in the light of Heidegger’s work
is sometimes known as existential psychotherapy, but Binswanger’s
own preferred term was Daseinsanalyse.89 Initially it seemed that
Heidegger supported what Binswanger was doing, but in later years

voiced criticisms of his approach. This was, in large part, because he
felt Binswanger was not sufficiently interrogating the ontological ques-
tion of being, and remained at the ontic level of the characteristics of
particular beings.90 Binswanger too was not uncritical, and in particu-
lar challenged Heidegger’s notion of Sorge, care with a stress instead
on love.91 Heidegger’s Zollikon seminars, organized with Medard
Boss, a former student of Binswanger, develop Daseinsanalysis in a
different direction.92 It may have been the link to Boss that led to the
distance from Binswanger.93
One of the key themes of Foucault’s manuscript is to assess if
Binswanger was able to ‘move from a descriptive and still prescientific
apprehension of the human being [Menschsein] to a rigorously scien-
tific anthropology’.94 Foucault’s aim, as elsewhere, is more explicitly
to situate Binswanger between Freud and Husserl,95 though he also
recognizes the essential dialogue with Heidegger. The manuscript
makes extensive reference to a range of Binswanger’s works, the
vast majority of which had to be read in the original German. These
include the major work Grundformen und Erkenntnis menschlichen
Daseins [Fundamental Forms and Knowledge of Human Dasein], the
book Über Ideenflucht [On the Flight of Ideas],96 the case studies from
Schizophrenie, particularly Binswanger’s discussion of Ellen West
and Jürg Zünd, and many essays including ‘Dream and Existence’,
which Foucault and Verdeaux would go on to translate, and ‘The
Daseinsanalytical School of Thought in Psychiatry’.97
Foucault is interested in Binswanger both as a demonstration of
the practice of Daseinsanalysis, but more significantly for showing
the relations between ontology and anthropology in his thought as
a whole.98 As Basso indicates, the manuscript shows how in this
period Foucault clearly prefers the Daseinsanalysis of Binswanger and
his colleagues to ‘the anthropological-phenomenological project of
Sartre’, despite their shared interest in ‘concrete knowledge of man’.99
In contrast to some other approaches in psychology, Foucault sees
Binswanger’s project of Daseinsanalysis as concerned with modes of
being of the human, which comes from his analysis of patients. This
is the approach of the case studies of schizophrenia, for example.
Among these, Foucault analyses the case of Ellen West in particular
detail,100 but also a case by Kuhn.101
West– a pseudonym– was a young woman who had suffered from
anorexia and depression, and then tried to commit suicide four times.
She was referred to Binswanger, who diagnosed her with schizophre-
nia. Though she spent time in the Bellevue sanatorium, and there
were hopes of her cure, Binswanger was eventually unable to help
further. West was insistent on her wish to die, and eventually she
was released into the care of her husband, even though Binswanger
and his colleagues knew she would kill herself. Within a few days
she took poison and died. In his analysis of the case, Binswanger
interprets her suicide as her only resolution ‘to the impossibility of
an appropriate [or authentic, eigentlichen] being-toward-death’.102
Yet her case happened in the early 1920s, and Binswanger did not
publish his analysis of the case until the mid 1940s. When he wrote
it is subject to dispute.103 His Daseinsanalysis of the case is thus
entirely retrospective: Heidegger had not even published Being and
Time when West was treated. Binswanger himself claimed that some
distance was necessary, because in this instance he had access to ‘an
unusual abundance of spontaneous and immediately comprehensible
verbal manifestations such as self-descriptions, dream accounts, diary
entries, poems, letters, autobiographical drafts; whereas usually, and
especially in cases of deteriorated schizophrenics, we have to obtain
the material for Daseinsanalysis by persistent and systematic explo-
ration of our patients over months and years’.104 As Naamah Akavia
has noted, in 1929 Binswanger’s eldest son killed himself at the age
of twenty, and may have shaped Binswanger’s retrospective reading
of the case.105 Much of the reaction to the case has been critical of the
diagnosis, treatment and subsequent discussion.
Foucault explores whether Binswanger’s analyses speak just to the
ontic level in Heidegger’s terms, or are able to reveal ontological
structures. While the case studies tend towards phenomenological
description, but not the more fundamental question of being in gen-
eral, Foucault suggests that Binswanger’s work is able to reveal the
ontological too.106 As such, Binswanger’s work is valued both for its
specifics and for its exposure of deeper structures, just as Heidegger’s
analysis of angst, thrownness and facticity did.107
One of these aspects is space and time, and the discussion of
spatiality in Heidegger’s Being and Time is explicitly related to
Binswanger’s work on space.108 Foucault makes a distinction between
‘the space of the body and the space of the milieu or the entourage
(the Leibraum and the Umraum)’. Here he makes a passing refer-
ence to von Weizsäcker’s work Der Gestaltkreis on the notion of
Leistung, performance or achievement.109 Foucault also draws out
the importance of Binswanger’s analysis of the Umwelt, Mitwelt
and Eigenwelt of West. The Umwelt is the environment, milieu or
surrounding world; the Mitwelt the shared world with others; and
the Eigenwelt the one-world or the proper world– E igenlichkeit
being the Heideggerian term for appropriateness, often translated as
authenticity. Here Foucault provides the terms in German, and glosses
them in French: Umwelt is the material milieu, Mitwelt the social

milieu and Eigenwelt the interior world.110 When he and Verdeaux
come to translate Binswanger, and he and Daniel Rocher translate
von Weizsäcker, they make some different choices, as Chapter 4 will
discuss. Not following the translations in this manuscript suggests it
was written before the translation’s completion in 1954.
The interest in the philosophical project behind the psychoanalysis
helps to explain why Foucault was intrigued by Binswanger, and
saw him at this time as a valuable supplement to his interest in
philosophical anthropology. This contribution is particularly the case
with the book Grundformen und Erkenntnis menschlichen Daseins,
which explicitly attempts to provide an ontological foundation to the
analyses. As Foucault recognizes, this particularly comes in the stress
on love instead of care.111 But Foucault is also critical of this move,
suggesting that Binswanger presents us with the choice between
‘returning to the problem of expression, the analysis of language
. . . and a metaphysical recourse to the classical theme of love’. In
an intriguing anticipation of the work he would himself do in the
last years of his life in the later volumes of the History of Sexuality,
Foucault makes reference to Binswanger’s addition of ‘an old meta-
physics of love, retrieved [réassortie] from a converted Plato, baptized
and sanctified by the Church fathers’.112
Ultimately, Foucault suggests that Binswanger is faced with a set of
choices– ‘between history and eternity, between the concrete commu-
nication of humans and the metaphysical communion of existences,
between immanence and transcendence; in short between a philoso-
phy of love and the analysis of phenomena of expression, between
metaphysical speculation and objective reflexion’.113 Binswanger opts
for speculation, the philosophy of love. But Foucault ends with an
intriguing suggestion that this choice might be best explored through
an examination of a ‘privileged case, the problem of art and aesthetic
phenomena’.114 He does not expand on this comment, but simply
suggests that there the choice of Daseinsanalysis will become more
explicit. It is notable that this manuscript is almost entirely devoid of
the literary examples which Foucault uses in his introduction to the
translation of ‘Dream and Existence’.
Foucault situates Binswanger’s texts and their analyses in relation
to a wide range of philosophical and psychological literature. In terms
of the psychology references, among others, he mentions Charles
Blondel, Freud, Lagache, Eugen Bleuler, the sociologist Maurice
Halbwachs, and Karen Horney’s New Ways in Psychoanalysis. He
also briefly discusses Delay’s work on electroshock treatment,115 and
the biological work of Jakob von Uexküll.116 There are a range of
philosophical works discussed as well, including Husserl’s Ideas I

in the Ricœur translation, and later to the then-untranslated Ideas
II, Formal and Transcendental Logic, and his Experience and
Judgment,117 along with the Origin of Geometry and the related
work of Oskar Becker on the phenomenology of geometry.118 The
manuscript has some early references to Nietzsche, though these are
infrequent, and the only text cited is On the Genealogy of Morality.119
Foucault also mentions Heidegger’s ‘The Essence of Truth’,120 Jaspers,
General Psychopathology (in French translation),121 Ernst Cassirer’s
Mythical Thought,122 and Boss’s Meaning and Content of Sexual
Perversions.123
While Foucault did not publish this text, it was quite well devel-
oped. Foucault did, of course, write an introduction to ‘Dream and
Existence’, but it is thematically, not textually linked to his manuscript.
In that introduction Foucault indicates a wider work on Binswanger,
and it seems likely he had this manuscript in mind. As the end of this
chapter will indicate, he also appears to have made reference to it in
an institutional review for the University of Lille. While it might seem
just a tantalizing glimpse of a path Foucault chose not to pursue, it
helps both to situate the work on Binswanger and to show how these
early concerns led to the History of Madness. An indication of a key
future theme is the way that Foucault poses his concern in terms of
the relation between the normal and the pathological.124 Intriguingly,
given Foucault’s later use of the term, he suggests that ‘there is sick-
ness when history becomes the archaeology of evolution’.125
‘Phénoménologie et psychologie’
A manuscript with the title ‘Phéno et y’ is another extremely densely
written text, with only a small margin on the left side of each page,
and writing continuing right to the foot of the page.126 The title is
followed by the date 1953–4, and Foucault likely gave a course with
this title in that year, though other indications suggest it was given in
1954–5, possibly as a repeat.127 Sabot adds that the course delivered
included a lecture on psychology in Husserl and Merleau-Ponty,128 for
which a manuscript can be found at the BNF, though archived sepa-
rately.129 There is also a twelve-page manuscript entitled ‘Psychologie
et phénoménologie’, which seems to date from the same period, and
looks like a lecture or outline, though it bears only thematic rather
than structural relation to the manuscript.130
However, the main manuscript preserved is unlikely to be a course.
There are relatively few crossings out or reorganization of material:
it looks like a fair copy, written in full sentences. On several pages of

the main manuscript there are footnotes, written in ascending order
– Foucault would have filled in the first on the notional bottom line,
and then added more as the page was filled up with text. While he did
similarly for the Binswanger manuscript, this course is more complete
in its annotation. It has all the appearance of a book or thesis man-
uscript. It is hard to see how it could have served as the basis for a
course, though it may have begun as one. There are page numbers in
the top right of each recto page in pencil for the first nine sheets, after
which it is entirely unnumbered.
Foucault begins with the claim that:
The tradition attributed two forms to psychological experience, recog-

nizing each as an independent source: introspection, the various levels
of which recognize the concrete domain of self-consciousness; and
objective observation, the scientific forms of which are detached from
their basis in experience of the world. In the first psychology sought its
philosophical foundation, in the other its scientific justification. The
situation was clear, but it was an alibi: psychology was never where it
was suspected to be.131
These subjective and objective forms of experience structure much

of what will follow. The first main division is entitled ‘Birth of a
Mythology’, and he mentions the death of God as contributing to
this, which may be a result of his reading of Nietzsche.132 There is
another division, again labelled as the first, entitled ‘The essence of
lived experience’; then ‘The disenchanted world’;133 ‘The awakening
[or vigil, veille] of being’;134 and an unnumbered final part ‘The lan-
guage of being’.135
In early parts of the manuscript, Foucault regularly mentions philos-
ophers such as Spinoza, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Kant and Feuerbach.
Bachelard is said to have undertaken the same kind of historical
approach to scientific myths that Foucault thinks is appropriate to his
subject matter.136 This is alongside a few references to psychologists
such as Freud, Politzer, Kurt Lewin, the Gestaltists and Binswanger.
Later he again shows the detail of his engagement with German
philosophy. He makes reference to works by Theodor Lipps, Wilhelm
Wundt, Paul Natorp and Carl Stumpf, Richard Avenarius and Alexis
Meinong.137 Franz Brentano is also often mentioned.
Husserl is by far the most frequent reference however, with Foucault
remarking at one point that it is difficult to say if Husserl knew Freud,
but nonetheless there are some parallels.138 Husserl takes centre stage
in ‘The essence of lived experience’, especially its first section on
‘Psychology and Theory of Knowledge’. Foucault’s use of Husserl
is extensive, drawing upon a range of texts from the Philosophy

of Arithmetic to the Logical Investigations, and later to the Ideas,
Zeitbewusstseins [Phenomenology of Internal Time Consciousness],
the Cartesian Meditations, Experience and Judgment and The Crisis
of European Sciences.139 Indeed, Husserl is the major reference
throughout the manuscript, to an almost overwhelming degree: this is
a manuscript on Husserl, with the majority of references to the Ideas.
Foucault essentially bypasses the French existentialist development
of phenomenology, returning to Husserl rather than reading him
through Sartre or Merleau-Ponty.140
One of the key themes is the question of world. Phenomenology
is conceived as a ‘science of beginnings’, an ‘archaeology’, aiming
to uncover ‘the foundations of the world’.141 This is a mode of
disenchantment, though Heidegger objects to Husserl’s approach,
suggesting that ontology is reduced to subjective consciousness. For
Heidegger, in contrast, an analysis of Dasein, especially in its mode
of being-in-the-world, is the way into the question of ontology.142
Foucault here is more Husserlian than Heideggerian, barely mention-
ing Heidegger and suggesting that Husserl is a significant break from
Kantian synthesis, allowing us insight into both the meaning of being
and the question of the world.143
Defert notes that in July 1953 Foucault studied some of Husserl’s
manuscripts at the ENS (C 18–19/19). Some of Foucault’s extensive
notes on Husserl, dating from this time, make reference to these man-
uscripts.144 The complete collection is housed in Louvain, where it
was taken by Herman van Breda in 1939 to protect it from the Nazis.
Husserl’s last two assistants, Ludwig Landgrebe and Fink, were
instrumental in transferring the material and making transcriptions.
During the war the manuscripts were hidden in various places, and
narrowly avoided destruction.145 Using the archive in Louvain was an
important rite of passage for any student of Husserl.146 The ENS man-
uscripts were given by van Breda to Merleau-Ponty and Trân Duc
Thao. Along with other archives in Germany and the US, the ENS
retains copies of the manuscripts in a dedicated library.147 Foucault
also read Thao’s Phenomenology and Dialectical Materialism, a book
that reconciles a Husserlian account of consciousness with a Marxist
approach to labour and which was published in 1951.148 Some cita-
tions from this work are in Foucault’s Husserl notes, and Derrida
recalled many years later that it was Foucault who introduced him
to this text.149 It seems at this point in his career that an interest in
Husserl might be a major focus of Foucault’s work. In January 1953
he wrote to J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck) publishers in Tübingen,
asking for the translation rights to Husserl’s essay ‘Philosophie als
strenge Wissenschaft [Philosophy as a Rigorous Science]’, which

were granted, but he did not pursue it. This is probably because
Quentin Lauer presented a translation of it as his secondary thesis
in 1954– a thesis supervised by Bachelard and in a series edited by
Hyppolite.150
Indeed, Foucault moved away from this interest entirely, and does not
discuss Husserl at length in published works.151 He most commonly refers
to Cartesian Meditations and the Crisis (i.e. DE#50 II, 613; DE#169 III,
31; SKP 175; DE#361 IV, 767; EW II, 468–9). The Crisis in particular,
seems to appeal to him as a more historical study, something which he
criticizes Husserl for neglecting elsewhere (DE#109 II, 372; FL 97). He
sometimes contrasts his own approach, owing more to Nietzsche, to
Husserl;152 or discusses him in relation to the question of the subject,
which he was trying to break away from initially and later to examine
historically (DE#85 II 164–5). From such remarks it might appear that
his knowledge of Husserl was relatively limited, although there is some
more detailed discussion of the Logical Investigations in the Binswanger
introduction, along with a brief mention of the Origin of Geometry
(DE#1 I 69, 74–9, 101; DIE 34, 38–42, 60; see DE#2 I, 127). One of the
points there, as in the Binswanger manuscript and also hinted at in this
manuscript, is the coincidence of the Logical Investigations and Freud’s
The Interpretation of Dreams. The Origin of Geometry would of course
become more famous when Merleau-Ponty lectured on it at the Collège
de France between 1959 and 1960, and then Derrida wrote a long intro-
duction to its translation in 1962.153 But any impression of Foucault’s
limited knowledge of Husserl is fundamentally challenged by the detailed
and nuanced reading provided in this manuscript. Additionally, a decade
after his Lille lectures, Foucault’s 1966–7 course at the University of
Tunis on philosophical discourse owed something to Husserl.154
Other Materials
There are various reports of other lectures given during this period.
In Lille, Sabot indicates that Foucault gave some classes on ‘General
Psychology’, including lectures on ‘Child Psychology and Pedagogy’,
‘Social Psychology’ and ‘Psychology of Man at Work’. Foucault also
taught on some of the philosophy courses, though details are scant.
Sabot reports that Foucault contributed to courses on ‘General History
of Philosophy’, ‘General Philosophy and Logic’, and ‘Morals and
Sociology’.155 Lagrange and Simon have some notes from courses they
attended at the ENS. It is very difficult to summarize what Foucault
actually said when the sources are student notes, but the notes sometimes
relate to Foucault’s own manuscript materials, some of which are

unclassified, and indeed indicate these were used for lectures.
Lagrange has some quite extensive notes on a class on child psy-
chology from the ENS in 1953.156 There are a surprising number of
dates, figures and statistics in Lagrange’s notes, including discussion
of IQ tests, and suggest that the course is perhaps the beginning
of Foucault’s long-standing interest in heredity.157 Foucault draws
upon material including studies of twins to understand the relation
between environment and heredity, early development of children,
and the Stanford–Binet test on cognitive ability. He also discussed
Philippe Pinel and Jean-Étienne Esquirol, but here they are of interest
as figures in the development of psychological approaches, rather
than the more critical way Foucault will discuss them in the History
of Madness.
From the ENS, Lagrange also has notes for 1953 lectures on
‘Rapports de la personnalité et de la maladie mentale’; ‘Rapports
de la folie avec les situations sociales’, and ‘L’Angoisse’. The first of
these outlines many themes developed in the book Maladie mentale
et personnalité, published the following year (see Chapter 3). Among
other themes it discusses Jules Baillarger, John Hughlings Jackson,
Théodule-Armand Ribot and Henri Ey, on aphasia and neurology.158
The second also connects to the 1954 book in content and style,
rather than the more critical later approach. Among other themes, it
discussed autism, the work of Blondel and Freud’s case study of Judge
Schreber.159 The notes on anguish connect to some of Foucault’s own
material.160 He begins with the conventional work of Pierre Janet,
but shifts to the more recent work of Kurt Goldstein, and shows
Foucault’s interest in this recurrent phenomenological and existential
theme with discussion of Binswanger, and his relation to Heidegger,
but also to Scheler and Husserl. Foucault seems to have connected this
discussion with his work on earlier figures like Feuerbach and Marx,
and Lagrange’s notes end with a cryptic reference to Sartre’s study of
Baudelaire.161 There are also brief notes from Simon on cybernetics,
but it is not clear that these are from a course by Foucault.162
Foucault seems to have given a course on ‘Psychologie sociale’
at the ENS. Lagrange’s notes for this are limited, and appear to be
from a lecture in 1953,163 but Simon provides a brief outline of a
course under this title from 1951, which would be from Foucault’s
first year teaching there.164 But there is doubt over the date because
on the back of the page, crossed out, there is the beginning of notes
from a lecture by Beaufret in December 1953. A few lines of the
outline follow this, which suggest it postdates the Beaufret lecture.
Foucault may have repeated the course, or later reused material for
a single lecture. The outline indicates the relation between the indi-
vidual and collective, at institutions, at belief, attitude and opinion,
and group and cultural psychology. Indicative figures mentioned
include William McDougall, Alfred Espinas, Gabriel Tarde, Abram
Kardiner’s work on basic personality structure, Ralph Linton’s Study
of Man, Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, Hume, Janet, Jacob Moreno
and American psychology.
Lagrange’s 1953 lecture notes overlap with this, but they begin
with a discussion of the relation between animal and human society.
It outlines the ‘evolutionist schema’, where sexuality leads to soci-
ety, initially of the couple, and from there to the family and group.
But it seems that Foucault challenged this by suggesting society is
independent of sexuality and that families do not constitute society.
Foucault shifts to a psychological account, discussing several of the
figures from Simon’s outline, but also very briefly, Nietzsche.165 The
relation between Husserl and Freud is outlined– a theme developed
in Foucault’s work on Binswanger– a s well as Rorschach tests.166
Much more extensive are Lagrange’s notes from a 1953 course on
‘La Psychologie génétique’; and Simon’s from a course which ran from
16 November 1953 to 29 March 1954 on ‘La Causalité psychologique’.
Lagrange’s notes indicate the former was another course on child devel-
opment, looking at the relation between individual development and
social conditions, drawing on a range of key figures in child develop-
ment, including Piaget, Melanie Klein, Anna Freud, Dorothy Burlingham
and Maria Montessori.167 It had a long discussion of the development
of spatial structures,168 of personality disorders in young children,169 the
Oedipal complex, intellectual and moral development, and IQ, among
other themes.170 There are brief mentions of Lacan and Merleau-Ponty.171
The course seems to have ended with a call for a ‘truly materialist his-
tory of child activity’.172 Foucault told Jean-Paul Aron in 1952 that he
planned to publish on genetic psychology, perhaps in La Raison, but no
manuscript seems to have survived.173
In contrast, materials relating to causality appear in Foucault’s own
notes, and tally quite closely with Simon’s notes.174 The material seems
to have connected regular themes from this period with some differ-
ent, more technical themes. There is some philosophical background
with problems from Husserl, Merleau-Ponty, Leibniz and Hegel, but
then it shifts to explore psychology in more detail. This included a
discussion of Freud’s work, including his ‘Dora’ case. Foucault has a
set of notes on ‘Causalité et genèse y’: a title which appears in Simon’s
notes when he begins his page numbering again. It is possible that this
course and the one for which Lagrange has notes are related.175 This
lecture contained a very detailed discussion of Piaget, including his
book with Bärbel Inhelder, The Child’s Conception of Space.176

There are various other notes filed with the more complete Lille
manuscripts. This material is somewhat disorganized, with loose
sheets, some grouped together and some not, which may be individ-
ual lectures from this period rather than parts of entire courses. Most
are much more schematic than the complete manuscripts, though
some switch style to more fully worked out text. None are dated.
Some of the titles relate to Lagrange and Simon’s notes, and some
connect to the courses, so some concrete links are possible, but much
remains uncertain.
The topics of these materials range from philosophy to psychol-
ogy and, especially, their relation. Foucault connects these themes
in intriguing ways. He is interested in reading Husserl, in particular,
in less explored ways, linking him to Freud or anthropology, for
example. There are detailed notes on Husserl, including a 46-page
manuscript, with some inserted pages and notes, which outline tradi-
tional ways of reading him, along with notes from his 1907 lectures
on the Idea of Phenomenology, the opening five lectures of the course
now better known as Thing and Space.177 These may relate to the
course which preceded the manuscript ‘Phéno et y’, discussed above.
Foucault’s knowledge of the wider philosophical tradition is clearly
extensive. As well as the thinkers who form a focus of his courses,
especially the one on philosophical anthropology, there are references
to Leibniz, Spinoza, Hume, and again Sartre’s study of Baudelaire.178
There are lectures that cover sociology or traditional anthropology,
with references to Émile Durkheim, Marcel Mauss and Claude Lévi-
Strauss.179 There are also detailed notes on ‘Maladie et personnalité
chez Freud’, including an examination of the famous ‘Wolf Man’
case.180 Macey also indicates a lecture on Freud’s ‘Beyond the Pleasure
Principle’ at the ENS, though no date or other details.181
From all this material it is clear that Foucault took his teaching
and preparation very seriously. The lectures generally seem to be spe-
cific, wide-ranging in scope but careful on detail, lacking the kind of
rhetorical flourishes Foucault would become known for later. These
lectures and manuscripts, like most of the early publications, gener-
ally lack the kind of literary examples Foucault would use, beginning
from the Binswanger introduction.182
Hospitals and Prisons

Foucault’s teaching in Lille and in Paris frequently overlapped, but
this was still an impressive balancing act of duties, especially when
combined with the writing he was doing at the time. But this was
not all. After undertaking his psychiatric studies in the early 1950s,
Foucault also worked at the Hôpital Saint-Anne in Paris. At the
Hôpital, Foucault was a stagiaire, a trainee, who was unpaid and
which had no official status or duties.183 He worked with Georges
and Jacqueline Verdeaux, who had set up an electroencephalogra-
phy unit in the hospital, alongside Delay.184 Jacqueline had known
Foucault since his childhood, as her parents had been friends of the
Foucaults. She had spent the war with her brother in the safety of
Poitiers, and during that time she became the assistant anaesthetist to
Foucault’s father, Dr Paul Foucault.185 Delay had first met Foucault
as a patient, when Foucault had been referred for his own depressive
episodes, before teaching him in the diploma in psychopathology.186
Genette tells the story of Foucault inviting his ENS students to visit
his laboratory. He led them to a dark closet, from which he extracted
a shoe box containing a white mouse, and told them that this box was
the ENS’s new psychology laboratory.187 His own experimental work
does not seem to have developed beyond this, and it was with others
that he gained these practical skills. The work that the Verdeaux were
undertaking at Saint-Anne was both experimental and part of the
hospital’s clinical work. Their research used electroencephalography,
polygraph tests, respiration and other physiological measures, and
tracked how these were affected by sensory stimuli such as music,
but also drugs. They published several articles on this work, many in
collaboration with Delay, leading to a handbook authored by the two
men.188 Macey reports that Foucault was used as both ‘an experimen-
tal subject or as an experimenter’, also producing reports on patients
and conducting tests.189 Some experiments involved animal testing.190
It was here that Foucault learnt how to use Rorschach tests, which
he practised on friends and family, including his younger brother.191
Eribon notes that Foucault gave a course on the tests as late as the
early 1960s when he was teaching at Clermont-Ferrand.192
Foucault also worked twice a week at the Centre Nationale d’Ori-
entation, based at the Fresnes prison in Val-de-Marne about ten miles
southeast of Paris.193 It had a new electroencephalographic unit, run
by the Verdeaux couple. The technique used electrodes to trace brain
function in response to stimuli of various kinds. With the prisoners
it was in part to assess mental health, brain injuries, and epilepsy as
well as to determine if symptoms were genuine or faked.194 Jacqueline
would collect Foucault from the ENS when she drove down, and he
would work alongside her, taking notes and evaluating and discussing
cases.195 The CNO– later the Centre national d’évaluation– had been
set up in 1950 and began work in 1951. Its purpose was to assess the
medical and psychological state of prisoners on their entry into the

French prison system, a kind of penal triage.196 These might be first
offenders or recidivists, well known to the system. A prisoner would
have existing files of their criminal history, arrest details, social assess-
ment, medical record and psychiatric reports.197 But the CNO was not
just a place for assessment of existing material: it was an experimental
centre too. As well as gathering more background information, a full
medical assessment would be conducted by a physician, looking at
the individual’s physical and pathological status. In addition, a psy-
chiatrist would examine psychopathic traits, both of the individual
and their family to judge hereditary potential. A ‘psycho-technician’
would conduct a series of tests for suicide risk, suitability for work
and education. This would help to determine which kind of insti-
tution they should be sent to, and whether they needed specialist
attention. Finally, a social assessment would be made to judge social
behaviour and how a prisoner would deal with groups and solitary
confinement.198
A 1955 article notes that Foucault had developed a test on a
tachistoscope– a device which shows images for a brief period of
time to assess recognition. The experiment was one where the subject
viewed a ‘series of simple or complex geometric shapes and a series of
images relating to the human body’. The test was to see how long they
needed to be exposed to these images before being able to perceive
and describe them.199 Tellingly, the subjects of this research were
described as ‘the mentally ill, delinquents and normal subjects’.200
Delay and Verdeaux were also interested in the use of electroenceph-
alography in legal questions.201 It is not difficult to see how so many
of the themes of Foucault’s later work are intertwined here, from
the obvious questions of mental illness and incarceration, to the role
of psychiatric expertise in the criminal system and questions of the
dangerous individual.202 The building up of a series of records on
those sentenced for crimes would have an echo twenty years on: these
were precisely the kind of reports Foucault and his Collège de France
colleagues would compile for the dossier on the Pierre Rivière case.203
Foucault only rarely talked about these experiences, and his rec-
ollections are not always entirely consistent. Macey wonders if this
is due to ‘reluctance’ or a ‘hazy memory’.204 In 1976 in an interview
with the Hérodote journal, Foucault directly made a link between
his research and this practical experience: ‘I tried first to do a gene-
alogy of psychiatry because I had had a certain amount of practical
experience in psychiatric hospitals and was aware of the combats, the
lines of force, tensions and points of collision which existed there’
(DE#169 III, 29; SKP 174). In 1981, he reportedly said that he felt
‘very close to and not very different from the inmates’, and that he
was having doubts about the work that fed into his later research:
‘I was uneasy about the profession of medicine. It was there that the
question was planted: What is medical power? What is the authority
that permits it?’205 In October 1982 in Vermont Foucault suggests this
work was a deliberate tactic:
I used to work in a psychiatric hospital in the 1950s. After having

studied philosophy, I wanted to see what madness was: I had been mad
enough to study reason; I was reasonable enough to study madness.
I was free to move from the patients to the attendants, for I had no
precise role. It was the time of the blooming of neurosurgery, the
beginning of psychopharmacology, the reign of the traditional institu-
tion. At first I accepted things as necessary, but then after three months
(I am slow-minded!), I asked, ‘What is the necessity of these things?’
(DE#362 IV, 779; TS 11)
Earlier in 1982 he had discussed his work at Sainte-Anne with

Stephen Riggins, who questions him on the unusual identification
with the patients. Foucault does not mention he had been treated by
Delay himself, but suggests his identification was partly because he
was ‘not officially appointed’, and that he had a ‘very strange status’
as a student.
There was no clear professional status for psychologists in a mental

hospital. So as a student in psychology (I studied first philosophy and
then psychology) I had a very strange status there. The chef de service
[Delay] was very kind to me and let me do anything I wanted. But
nobody worried about what I should be doing; I was free to do any-
thing. I was actually in a position between the staff and the patients,
and it wasn’t my merit, it wasn’t because I had a special attitude– it
was the consequence of this ambiguity in my status which forced me
to maintain a distance from the staff. I am sure it was not my personal
merit because I felt all that at the time as a kind of malaise. It was
only a few years later when I started writing a book on the history of
psychiatry that this malaise, this personal experience, took the form of
an historical criticism or a structural analysis. (EW I, 123; DE#336 IV,
527–8; see E 93–4)
Riggins questions whether the Saint-Anne hospital would have had

a particularly negative effect, and Foucault is quick to dismiss this,
saying that it was typical of a large hospital and ‘one of the best in
Paris’. Indeed, this was key to his diagnosis, suggesting that ‘maybe
if I had been doing this kind of work in a small provincial hospital I
would have believed its failures were the result of its location or its
particular inadequacies’ (EW I, 124; DE#336 IV, 528). Foucault’s

later discussions of the 1975 film Histoire de Paul, which were set in
an asylum, are also intriguing. Foucault suggests that while the direc-
tor René Féret used professional actors, he was able to create what
the asylum was, because he put them in a real building and allowed its
rhythms and spaces to dictate the action.206 These comments, though
not explicitly recognized, clearly draw on his experience of being
inside such an institution.
In a 1978 interview Foucault discusses his encounter with one
patient: ‘It was then that I was put in contact with someone I will
call Roger, a patient of 22. . . We became good friends.’ Foucault
recounts how Roger was ‘very intelligent and sane [sensé]’ but that
he had moments, some violent, where ‘he had to be locked up’.
Eventually, following further mental deterioration, Roger was given a
prefrontal lobotomy for fear that he would kill himself. ‘I often asked
myself if death would not be preferable to a non-existence and if we
should be given the opportunity to do what we want with our lives,
whatever our mental state. For me the obvious conclusion is that even
the worst pain is preferable to a vegetative existence’ (DE#242 III,
671–2). Macey suggests that this encounter was the end of Foucault’s
aspirations to be a psychiatrist.207
In a television discussion in 1965 Foucault cautiously accepts Alain
Badiou’s suggestion that ‘psychology is knowledge of man’, though
cautions that while it sounds ‘too simple’, it is developed by Kant
into a much more profound project, explicitly linking it to the work
he did on philosophical anthropology in the 1950s (DE#30 I, 445–6;
EW II 26–57).208 Equally revealing is that Foucault is asked how he
would teach psychology in a philosophy class. His answer is that
first he would disguise his face and voice, and teach his students ‘the
techniques which are currently being used by psychologists, labora-
tory techniques, social psychology methods. I would try to explain to
them what psychoanalysis consists in.’ Then, in the second hour, out
of his disguise, they would do philosophy, reflecting on the psychoa-
nalysis, as ‘a kind of absolutely unavoidable and inevitable impasse
that Western thought entered into in the nineteenth century’, which
should be analysed not as a science, but as something ‘more or less
philosophical’. Then, in a phrase which would become famous in The
Order of Things the following year, Foucault says he would see it as
part of the ‘anthropological slumber’ from which philosophy and the
human sciences need to be awakened (DE#30 I, 448; EW II, 257–8).
While in 1965 Foucault was again teaching psychology to philosophy
students, now in Clermont-Ferrand, it is doubtless also a reflection
of his pedagogy, in and beyond the classroom, from a decade before.
Publications
In parallel with these teaching and practical experiences of psychol-
ogy, Foucault was also publishing. While at Lille he was required to
provide an account of the research work he had carried out in the
1952–3 academic year, for a report published in 1954. He did not
provide a report in his second year there, and had already left by
the end of the third year, so this is the only known source for this
period. Unsurprisingly, given the resources he had from his teaching,
he had the potential to publish a lot. The published list, with spelling
mistakes that are surely due to his handwriting, reads as follows:
1. Maladie mentale et personnalité. Work completed (in press).

2. ‘Eléments pour une histoire de la psychologie’, Article for new
edition of Histoire de la philosophie by A. Weber. Completed (in
press).
3. Psychiatrie et analyse existentielle (secondary thesis). Work com-
pleted (in press). Desclées [Desclée].
4. Translation of Gestsltmreis [Gestaltkreis] by von Weizsächser
[Weizsäcker]. To appear in July.
5. Introduction to Traum und Existenz. Study that should appear in
July with Desclées [Desclée].209
Four of these publications appeared over the next several years:

numbers 1 and 5 in 1954; 2 in 1957 and 4 in 1958. The work on
Binswanger and von Weizsäcker (numbers 4 and 5) will be discussed
in detail in Chapter 4; the book Maladie mentale et personnalité and
the chapter on the history of psychology (1 and 2) will be discussed in
Chapter 3, along with another chapter from the same time.
The puzzle therefore surrounds entry 3 on Foucault’s list. Eribon
reports that ‘no one has ever heard of this “secondary thesis”’ and
suggests that it might be double counting of number 5, or a future
piece referred to in the Binswanger introduction (DE#1 I, 65; DIE
31).210 However, with the deposit of Foucault’s papers at the BNF,
Basso has persuasively argued that the Binswanger manuscript is this
mysterious text.211
In a sense, what is surprising is less that Foucault partially used
teaching material for his subsequent publications, but that he did so
little with all this work. All three manuscripts discussed above, and
not just the one on Binswanger, are the length of a short book. The
one on ‘Phénoménologie et psychologie’ seems to post-date the Lille
list; the one on Anthropology is most obviously from teaching. As the
next chapter will discuss, Foucault’s publications on psychology all

use this work, and especially the extensive reading on these topics.
Foucault does not pursue these themes after 1955 and appears to
abandon his interest or move to a more critical position. What should
be remembered is that when in subsequent publications, lectures or
interviews Foucault discusses Hegel or Husserl, Freud or psychology,
it was on the basis of a thorough knowledge of this material.
3
Psychology and Mental Illness
Of Foucault’s limited publications in the 1950s, most were on psy-

chology. Two of these were in the Lille list mentioned at the end of
Chapter 2– the short book Maladie mentale et personnalité, pub-
lished in 1954, and a 1957 book chapter. Another chapter appeared
in 1957, but the order in which these early publications appeared is
misleading. The first to be written was likely ‘La Psychologie de 1850
à 1950 [Psychology from 1850 to 1950]’, commissioned by Denis
Huisman in 1952 and written between then and 1953.1 Huisman’s
project was to update Alfred Weber’s nineteenth-century Histoire
de la philosophie européenne.2 The new edition did not appear in
print until 1957, probably due to the collaborative nature of this
large project.3 Most of the contributors were French, including early
work by Lyotard and Ricœur. Huisman himself adds a number
of pieces, Beaufret wrote the chapter on Heidegger, and Husserl’s
Encyclopaedia Britannica entry on phenomenology was translated
for the collection.4 Foucault’s friend Jean-Paul Aron wrote the chap-
ter on ‘Le Nietzscheisme’.5 Around the same time (though not in the
Lille list), Foucault wrote another survey on ‘La Recherche scienti-
fique et la psychologie [Scientific Research and Psychology]’ for the
collection Des chercheurs français s’interrogent, which again was
only published in 1957.6 If the first was largely historical, the second
was on contemporary work. These two pieces were both written
while Foucault was researching and writing what was to be his first
book, Maladie mentale et personnalité, published in 1954. Despite
their concurrent genesis, as Eribon notes, the piece for Des chercheurs
français has ‘an entirely different tone’ to the book.7 The Binswanger
54 Psychology and Mental Illness
introduction, the last of these pieces written, will be discussed in

Chapter 4.
‘La Psychologie de 1850 à 1950’

Foucault was asked by Huisman to survey either psychology and soci-
ology, or just psychology. Foucault chose the latter, and as directed,
summarizes academic work over the last hundred years, a review of
the literature schematized into sections and subsections. Huisman
stressed it should be ‘short, superficial and quick’.8 Foucault accom-
plishes a lot in a short time, discussing work in French, German and
English, drawing on his wide reading in the subject both as a student,
and for the courses he was now teaching at Lille and the ENS. It
begins with a discussion of the relation of psychology to models
drawn from the natural sciences– the physical-chemical model, the
organic model, the evolutionist model. Foucault’s references include
John Stuart Mill, Xavier Bichat, François Magendie, Claude Bernard,
Herbert Spencer, and Théodule-Armand Ribot (DE#2 I, 122–4). It
then shifts to a discussion of the search for meaning in psychology,
moving to more philosophical sources such as Dilthey and Jaspers
(DE#2 I, 125–6).9 There follows quite an extensive discussion of
Freud, with a range of references to his work from The Interpretation
of Dreams, through works on sexuality, hysteria and psychoanalysis
to Totem and Taboo and Beyond the Pleasure Principle (DE#2 I,
127–9). Foucault then surveys a range of other approaches, includ-
ing behaviourism, Gestalt-theory, developmental psychology with
authors such as Piaget, Rorschach tests and collective psychology
such as the work of Claude Blondel, and its links to anthropological
research (DE#2 I, 130–5). In common with the book’s style Foucault
only provides limited bibliographical information in his references,
usually just title and year, sometimes not the full title and often not
providing an author first name or initial: the editors of Dits et écrits
have filled in much on his behalf, including French translations where
available.
The most important parts of the text for Foucault’s wider concerns
come predominantly in the introduction and the brief conclusion.
The introduction suggests there is a significant tension in psychol-
ogy. Foucault claims that ‘the psychology of the nineteenth century
has inherited from the Enlightenment [Aufklärung] the concern for
self-aligning with the sciences of nature and recovering in man the
extension of laws which regulate [régissement] natural phenom-
ena’ (DE#2 I, 120). This has meant that psychology has looked
Psychology and Mental Illness 55
at ‘quantitative relations, the elaboration of laws which have the

allure of mathematical functions, the implementation of explanatory
hypotheses’. Scientific psychology is thus grounded on philosophical
principles, a scientific positivism, which holds that the calculative
approach is sufficient, and the claim that ‘the truth of man is entirely
exhausted [épuisée] by his natural being’ (DE#2 I, 120). But this
position is paradoxical, Foucault suggests, and there is a tension
between the pursuit of the ‘ideal of rigour and exactitude of the natu-
ral sciences’ and the founding principles of psychology (DE#2 I, 120).
The problem of contemporary psychology– and which is a matter of

its life and death– is to know to what extent it effectively manages to
control the contradictions which produced it, through its abandon-
ment of the naturalistic objectivity which seems to be its other main
characteristic. The history of psychology must answer this question for
itself. (DE#2 I, 122)
After the survey of work Foucault concludes by suggesting that this

‘fundamental question remains’ (DE#2 I, 136), retracing the claims
he made in the essay’s introduction about the tension between the
scientific aspirations of psychology and the more anthropological
investigation of human existence. It becomes increasingly clear
that, for Foucault, psychology needs to supplement its project with
resources drawn from a wider range of human knowledge than the
natural sciences.
At the end of the essay, bringing the analysis up to his present,
Foucault begins to introduce themes that would be developed in
other writings of this period. He suggests that to fully grasp human
existence we need to move beyond simply using existing psychology,
moving towards an anthropology that would ‘analyse human exist-
ence in its fundamental structures’, and recovering ‘man as existence
in the world and characterizing each man by the style proper to this
existence’ (DE#2 I, 136). This Heideggerian language is unspecified
by Foucault, but he is clearly already drawing upon the relation
of this work to psychology in Daseinsanalysis. For Binswanger, he
suggests, alongside ‘an empirical analysis of the way in which human
existence is given in the world’, we need an ‘existential analysis of the
way in which that human reality is temporalized, is spatialized and
finally projects a world’ (DE#2 I, 136).10
While Heidegger and Binswanger are one indication of Foucault’s
wider reading, the other is his debt to work by Canguilhem and other
French philosophers of science. Foucault suggests that the history of
the discipline can shed valuable light on its current focus. Although
Foucault does not directly cite Canguilhem’s On the Normal and the
Pathological at this time, it is hard to ignore the implicit reference
when he claims that ‘contemporary psychology was, at its origin,
an analysis of the abnormal, of the pathological, of the conflictual,
a reflection on the contradictions of man with himself. And if it has
become a psychology of the normal, of the adaptive, the orderly
[ordonné], it is in a second way, as if by an effort to overcome
[dominer] these contradictions’ (DE#2 I, 122; see 150). Yet there is
something of a tension between the Heideggerian phenomenological
approach, with its inherent distrust of scientific method and data, and
an approach developed by Bachelard and Canguilhem to study the
physical and natural sciences.11
Foucault ultimately suggests that neither ‘statistical causality nor
anthropological reflection on existence’ can overcome these problems
(DE#2 I, 137). The essay ends with a return to the theme introduced
at its beginning:
Is not the future of psychology the taking seriously of these contra-

dictions, the precise conditions which have given birth to psychology?
Psychology will be possible only if it marks a return to the conditions
of existence of man and to what is most human in man, namely his
history. (DE#2 I, 137)
Possibly the very first publication Foucault completed, this essay is a

prologue to the attempts of Maladie mentale et personnalité and the
Binswanger introduction to find an alternative to current psychology.12
The version of the text reprinted in Dits et écrits omits a two-page
annotated bibliography included in the original chapter; as does the
version reprinted in Revue Internationale de Philosophie in 1990.13 It
is not clear why the bibliography is missing, but its absence in 1990
may explain its omission in 1994. The bibliography is revealing, in that
it references texts as late as January 1955 which are described as the
most useful for seeing a survey of the last hundred years of work in
psychology.14 One of these pieces is by Albert Burloud, who is credited
with ‘succeeding in synthesizing the objectivist tendency of third person
psychology with the traditional idea of a psychology of introspection’.
The other is by Maurice Pradines, and bibliographical references are
provided to many of Burloud and Pradines’s other works, including the
‘absolutely essential’ Traité de psychologie. Pradines is credited with
having ‘established, for the first time in the history of ideas, an authenti-
cally genetic method, a “history of mind [spirit]’”.15
Burloud died in 1954, which is mentioned here, and along with
the references to the 1955 articles by him and Pradines, help to
date at least this bibliography. The bibliography might have been

added after the essay itself, and it is possible that Foucault was not
its author, because his name appears at the end of the essay, and
before the bibliography, though this is the norm for other essays in
this collection. The rest of the bibliography lists a number of other
sources on various themes, which are grouped as first person, third
person and second person psychology.16 Among these are works by
Lagache,17 Sartre’s Sketch for a Theory of the Emotions, Merleau-
Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception, Freud’s Introductory Lectures
on Psychoanalysis, Goldstein’s The Organism and Marcel Foucault’s
La Psychophysique.18 For the most part these are not texts cited
in the summary part of the essay– they are largely supplementary
pieces to Foucault’s own analysis. The title at the head of the essay
is ‘La Psychologie de 1850 à 1950’, which is used for the reprints
in Revue internationale de philosophie and Dits et écrits, but the
original book’s Summary gives the title as ‘Les Sciences humaines et
la psychologie’; while the Contents at the back of the book and the
running heads simply say ‘La Psychologie’.19
‘La Recherche scientifique et la psychologie’

Whereas the Huisman chapter is historical and retrospective, the one
for Des chercheurs français s’interrogent is an assessment of the state
of the field. The book was edited by Jean-Édouard Morère, who went
on to be managing editor of Revue philosophique de la France et de
l’étranger.20 In a preface signed only by ‘G. H.’ the project is described
as one led by a ‘young agrégé in philosophy [in 1953], particularly
interested in the development of modern science’.21 The aim was to
bring together active young researchers from multiple fields: biology,
physics, medicine (both research and practice), geography, sociol-
ogy, astronomy, chemistry, management and philosophy. Foucault
was therefore commissioned as much as a practising psychological
researcher as a teacher, giving a sense of how he was viewed by his
contemporaries. As such, Foucault’s writing style is more contempo-
rary, less historical and at times polemical: quite different from the
other pieces he wrote around this time.
Foucault contrasts different approaches to psychology– that of
Pradines or Merleau-Ponty on the one hand, and that of Alfred Binet
and colleagues on the other, suggesting that this was the choice posed
to a beginning researcher. Binet is perhaps best known today for his
work on intelligence and developing an IQ test. Generalizing from
these specific figures, Foucault suggests that ‘one of the historical a
prioris of psychology, in its current form, is the possibility of being,

exclusively, scientific or not’ (DE#3 I, 138). Psychology is unusual in
this regard, he adds, and this is not a choice offered to doctors or biol-
ogists, whose work is in a field that is already interior to a scientific
objectivity. Other sciences have an earlier antecedent from which they
clearly distinguish themselves– chemistry is a move beyond alchemy,
for example (DE#3 I, 138). Foucault suggests that there is a possible
contrast between different types of psychology– ‘a psychology which
measures, counts and calculates, and a psychology which thinks,
reflects and which gradually becomes philosophy’ (DE#3 I, 138).
Ultimately, the scientific status of psychology is thus always in ques-
tion, in a way which is not an issue in other fields. Closing this initial
setting of the scene, Foucault suggests that ‘the question of research
demanding an account of a science, is a matter not of asking how it
conducts research within the space of science, but as the movement in
which science is sought’ (DE#3 I, 139).
Foucault discusses in detail the institutional support of psychol-
ogy, from laboratories and research universities to the groups of
researchers. Some of this shows his knowledge of the French univer-
sity system, and the different status of psychological research between
national centres and provincial universities. There is discussion of
various learned societies and the means of sharing information and
research practices (DE#3 I, 140–1). He also briefly mentions the splits
between some of the organizations (DE#3 I, 146 n. 1). Much of this,
of course, is of limited interest today, except perhaps for institutional
history and how Foucault is scathing about the state of the education
system. Some of the rest of the piece summarizes some familiar stories
– on the discovery of the unconscious, for example (DE#3 I, 142–3).
Foucault provides almost no references in the chapter. In one par-
agraph in the middle of the text he refers to a sequence of names
from the earlier part of the twentieth century– John B. Watson,
Paul Guillaume, Politzer, Lewin, ‘psychology “of phenomenological
inspiration”’ and Piaget. Foucault’s text merely mentions the sur-
names in the notes; the editors of Dits et écrits have filled in indicative
references (DE#3 I, 143–4). Foucault suggests that ‘the lesson of
theoretical psychology is no more than a rite: one learns and one
teaches psychological research, that is to say the research and critique
of psychology’ (DE#3 I, 145). He then spends a little while discussing
psychological education and training, suggesting that it is ‘both very
close and quite different’ from other students. With some of this he is
explaining his own training at the Institute of Psychology, explaining
the different components of its different diplomas in ‘experimental,
pedagogic, pathological and applied psychology’. They all contain
some theoretical work, some practical training in ‘tests, psychometry,

statistics’, laboratory work, and practical training placements. There
is a different rhythm to studies compared to traditional education–
students enter after an examination, and leave with a professional
diploma (DE#3 I, 145–6).
Foucault indicates what he calls a ‘paradoxical situation’– the
practical work of psychology, ‘in organizational practice, psycho-
therapeutic cures, or in teaching’, does not rely on theory, and is
accordingly not research driven. But research in psychology is moti-
vated by concerns that do not link to ‘the requirements of practice’
(DE#3 I, 147). This is again the contrast between the kind of philo-
sophical work in psychology done by Pradines or Merleau-Ponty and
the practically driven, scientific work of the others (DE#3 I, 147–8).
One of the paradoxes is that this ‘medical, scientific and even phil-
osophical training is surety and guarantee [caution et garantie] for
the recruitment of researchers who want to do positive psychology’
(DE#3 I, 147 n. 1). As he adds, ‘the non-existence of an autono-
mous and effective practice of psychology has paradoxically become
the condition for the existence of a positive, scientific and ‘effective’
research in psychology’ (DE#3 I, 148).
There are further issues about the use of tests developed in, for
example, psychometry, where these are employed in practice on the
basis of already assumed validity, which is itself not yet psychological.
Ultimately, Foucault claims, the scientific practice of psychology is
excluded, and research in this area is dependent on a practice that is
neither scientific nor psychological (DE#3 I, 149). ‘In its relation with
research, as with its relation to science, psychological research is not
a manifestation of the dialectic of truth, but only follows the wiles
[ruses] of mystification’ (DE#3 I, 149).
Foucault notes that it is curious that the practical applications of
psychology ‘never came from positive requirements, but always from
obstacles in the path of human practice’– examples including adap-
tation at work following Taylorism; psychometry and intelligence
measures from ‘Binet’s work on education delays and mental retar-
dation’. It shares this position with some other sciences– biology, for
example, while a science of life, makes progress by examining disease,
the dead organism: ‘it is from death that a science of life is possible,
even if one knows how to measure the total distance that separates
the anatomy of the corpse from the physiology of the living’ (DE#3 I,
152). Similarly, it is from studying the unconscious that a
psychology of consciousness which is not pure transcendental reflec-

tion becomes possible, from the point of view of perversion that a
psychology of love which is not an ethics becomes possible; from the

point of view of stupidity [bêtise] that a psychology of intelligence
can be constituted without at least an implicit reference to a theory of
knowledge [savoir]; from sleep, automatism and the involuntary that a
psychology of the awakened man perceiving the world, without confin-
ing ourselves to a purely phenomenological description. Psychology’s
positivity borrows from the negative experience through which man
makes himself. . . The disease is the psychological truth of health, to
the extent that it is its human contradiction. (DE#3 I, 152–3)
This, he suggests, is the way to understand the ‘scandal’ of Freud’s

work, in his reduction of ‘social and emotional relations in terms of
libidinal drives’. While others had made the argument about sexual
and natural drives, Freud showed how ‘love, social relationships and
form of belonging were the negative side of the sexuality as it was
the natural positivity of man’. Freud’s reversal ‘has now become the
condition of possibility of any psychological research’, where we ‘take
the negativity of man for his positive nature’. This is Freud’s signif-
icant breakthrough, not primarily the analysis of sexuality (DE#3 I,
153–4).
Foucault’s use of the ‘historical a priori’ was noted above in terms
of his fundamental determination of psychology. Elsewhere in this
piece he discusses the ‘conceptual and historical a priori’ (DE#3 I,
155). This term, which would become significant in his later work, is
here used without any discussion of its significance. Perhaps Foucault
means it in a fairly simple, Husserlian sense, where it suggests the
fundamental assumptions or grounding principles of a discipline. In
his later work he would use this as the beginning of an historical
investigation into the conditions of possibility for things to be as they
are, the basis of his history of systems of thought.22 Here, Foucault
is clear that these grounding issues of psychology are not to be seen
as part of its historical past, but fundamentally structure its present
too. As he suggests, ‘the contemporary difficulties of psychological
research are not part of its crisis of youth, they describe and denounce
its crisis of existence. . . the time of its youth has passed, but its youth
has not’ yet the crisis is not the youth in itself, but that it has ‘never
found the style or the face of its youth’ (DE#3 I, 155). Given the remit
of the piece he was commissioned to write, his focus keeps returning
to psychological research, though he suggests that this is more fun-
damental than perhaps generally acknowledged: ‘The only problem
which concerns us now is to know what is signified by psychology
as research, since psychology has entirely become research’ (DE#3 I,
156).
Macey reports that ‘Foucault was not particularly easy to work
with’, could make dismissive comments about psychiatry and psycho-

analysis, and ‘was capable of telling Verdeaux, in terms which were
not purely humorous, that he and his friends had been saying “nasty
things” about her and her work. His negative comments could also
spill over into print’.23 This piece provides Macey’s example. Foucault
makes contemptuous reference to ‘research on the ordinary, on the
neuroses of the rat, the statistical frequency of vowels in the English
translation of the Bible, on the sexual practices of the provincial
woman, in the lower middle class exclusively, on the cutaneous resist-
ance, blood pressure and breathing rhythms of people listening to the
“Symphony of Psalms”’ (DE#3 I, 156). Foucault adds a note to say
that because the article is not supposed to be a polemic, he has not
given the exact title of this research. But because it is supposed to be
critical, he has only altered some details out of ‘pure politeness’, and
not changed the essential aspects of the description (DE#3 I, 156 n.
1). Nonetheless, as Macey reports, Verdeaux recognized the analysis
when listening to the Symphony of Psalms as a description of her own
work at Sainte-Anne.24
Foucault’s draft notes for the text have the title ‘Scientific Research
in Psychology’,25 and this describes its content more appropriately.
He critically interrogates one of the two approaches in psychology,
although his approach is clearly more informed by the other. He is
clearly already taking something of a distance from his clinical experi-
ence, and ends the piece on a similarly critical note. Psychology might
base its research on ‘dubious medical concepts, but which for the
psychologist are objective because they are medical’, or there will be
‘years of work to apply factorial methods to research for which math-
ematical purification will never provide a validity which it did not
have at the outset’. Many of these problems are known: ‘it would take
pages to list the works which statistically demonstrate the invalidity
of a medical concept, or clinically [demonstrate] the ineffectiveness
of psychometric methods’ (DE#3 I, 157). Part of the problem is the
importing of methods and concepts from other fields, without regard
to their internal structure. ‘The real work of psychological research is
therefore neither the emergence of objectivity nor the foundation or
the progress of a technique, neither the constitution of a science, nor
the uncovering of a form of truth. Its movement, in contrast, is that
of a truth which is undone, of an object which is destroyed, a science
that seeks only to demystify itself’ (DE#3 I, 157).
Psychology has an ‘eternally infernal vocation’, which has been for-
gotten. If it is serious about wanting to locate ‘its meaning as equally
knowledge [savoir], as research and as practice, it should break away
from this myth of positivity with which it today lives and dies, and
find its own space internal to the dimensions of man’s negativity’

(DE#3 I, 158). This is one of things that Freud did most to perceive,
while at the same time ‘doing more than anyone to cover up and
hide it’ (DE#3 I, 158). Foucault then quotes the phrase from Virgil’s
Aeneid which Freud used as the epigraph to his The Interpretation of
Dreams: Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo– If I cannot
bend heaven, then I will move hell.26 Foucault ends with his own
aphorism: ‘Psychology will be saved only by a return to Hell’ (DE#3
I, 158).
The biographical details of these two texts are interesting. In the
piece for Des chercheurs français, it simply says that he was a former
student of the ENS, and had aggregated in philosophy.27 But in the
Weber and Huisman collection, as well as mentioning his training, and
that by the time of the book’s publication in 1957 he is now directing
the Institut Français in Uppsala, it also says that he is ‘the former head
of the Psychology Laboratory at the ENS’.28 However limited the ENS
lab may have been, his more practical work conducted in hospitals
and prisons explains his involvement in Des chercheurs français.
Maladie mentale et personnalité

While these two chapters are useful indications of Foucault’s interests
at this time, Maladie mentale et personnalité is much more signif-
icant. It appeared in the series ‘Initiation Philosophique’, with the
prestigious Presses Universitaires de France, edited by the Catholic
philosopher Jean Lacroix. Althusser, who had been Lacroix’s student,
was the link to Foucault, and he reports in a 27 February 1953 letter
that Lacroix had accepted the proposal.29 The copy Foucault gave
to Althusser makes no direct reference to the role he played, simply
saying ‘For Alth, as a mark of recognition and friendship, MF.’30 The
purpose of the series was to introduce students to various topics, and
Lacroix told Foucault the text should be ‘simple, clear, easy’.31 Other
volumes in the series include Lacroix’s own Les Sentiments et la vie
morale, Gaston Berger’s Caractère et personnalité and, a little later,
Lefebvre’s Problèmes actuels du marxisme and Althusser’s book on
Montesquieu.32 Foucault delivered the manuscript in October 1953.33
In what follows, page references will be given to the first edition
and, where reused in the revised edition of 1962, to that and its
English translation. Where passages are broadly the same, both ref-
erences will be given. Where they differ on a crucial point, the second
reference will be preceded by ‘compare’. A fuller discussion of the
changes and their importance will be found in Chapter 8.34
Foucault begins the book with two questions: ‘Under what

conditions can one speak of illness in the psychological domain?
What relations can one define between the facts of mental pathol-
ogy and those of organic pathology?’ (MMPe 1; MMPs 1/1). While
they naturally present different answers, Foucault suggests that all
psychopathologies engage with these questions. They range from psy-
chologies of heterogeneity, to ‘psychoanalytic or phenomenological’
psychologies, that try to grasp behaviour ‘prior to the distinction
between normal and pathological’, or ‘in the great debate between
psychogenesis and organogenesis’ (MMPe 1; MMPs 1/1).
Foucault says that these debates have been discussed at length, and
he will not add to them. Rather, he suggests that some of the prob-
lems stem from the way organic and mental pathology are uncritically
assimilated, with ‘concepts that are intended for somatic medicine’
applied to ‘psychological illness and health’. Foucault is interested
in the ‘abstract pathology’ that underpins and dominates them, and
imposes, ‘like so many prejudices, the same concepts and lays down
for them, like so many postulates, the same methods’ (MMPe 2;
MMPs 2/2). He suggests that if we are looking for ‘the root of mental
pathology’ we should not look at some kind of ‘metapathology’, but
rather ‘a reflexion on man himself’ (MMPe 2; compare MMPs 2/2).
In this, Foucault is already beginning to hint at the kind of work
he would later become famous for, of uncovering and outlining the
fundamental structures that make possible particular kinds of scien-
tific knowledge, and this makes a link to his interest in philosophical
anthropology. His account here recalls ‘how the traditional or more
recent psychopathologies were constituted’ and outlines ‘which pos-
tulates of mental medicine need to be liberated to achieve a scientific
rigour’ (MMPe 2; compare MMPs 2/2).
The first chapter discusses the relation that mental medicine has
to organic medicine, also dependent on a symptomology and a
nosography. Both sought out the relation between the illness and its
manifestations, to its development and forms (MMPe 3; MMPs 3/3).
Foucault gives examples from the beginning of the twentieth century,
including Ernest Dupré on hysteria and Janet on psychasthenia– a
kind of disorder with phobias, anxiety or obsessive or compulsive
behaviour. He suggests these are ‘descriptions whose archaism should
not allow us to forget they represented both a culmination and a
departure’ (MMPe 4; MMPs 4/3–4). He also discusses obsessions,
phobia, obsessional neurosis, mania and depression, paranoia,
chronic hallucinatory psychosis, hebephrenia and catatonia (MMPe
4–6; MMPs 4–6/4–5). The last three are discussed by Emil Kraepelin
as dementia praecox, a term taken up in work on schizophrenia by
Bleuler (MMPe 6; MMPs 6/5–6). Foucault compares this to organic

pathology with its division of symptoms into groupings, seeing
illnesses as structured by an essence and part of a ‘botanical species’
(MMPe 7; MMPs 7/6).
The problems of this approach included the tension between the
essentialist and naturalist postulates, which was challenged by new
developments such as the distinction between psychoses as ‘distur-
bances affecting the personality as a whole’, and neuroses which
affected ‘only a part of the personality’ (MMPe 9–10; MMPs 9–10/7–
8). Foucault says this is important because it is the personality that
‘becomes the element in which the illness develops and the criterion
by which it can be judged; it is both the reality and the measure of the
illness’ (MMPe 10; MMPs 10/8). This focus on the totality is another
way in which mental and organic pathology might be seen to be uni-
fied again, since both are concerned with ‘the same human individual
in its concrete reality’, and seem ‘to converge by the identity of their
methods and by the unity of their object’ (MMPe 10; MMPs 10/8–9).
Goldstein’s work is seen as a possible example of this, whose work
‘at the frontiers of mental medicine and organic medicine’, recog-
nized that both concerned ‘the overall situation of the individual in
the world’.35 Nonetheless, Foucault suggests that the ‘the euphoria
was not matched by an equal rigour’, and that it is important to
distinguish mental and organic pathology, suggesting ‘that it is only
by an artifice of language that the same meaning can be attributed to
“illnesses of the body” and “illnesses of the mind”’ (MMPe 10–12;
MMPs 10–12/10). He delineates the differences in three registers:
abstraction, the normal and the pathological, the patient and the
milieu. With each there is a fundamental difference.
For the first, psychology does not stand in relation to psychiatry
in the same way physiology did to medicine, in providing ‘a tool of
analysis that, in delimiting the disorder, makes it possible to envis-
age the functional relationship of this damage to the personality as
a whole’ (MMPe 13; MMPs 13/10). Second, medicine has recog-
nized that deviations were variations within ‘the normal mechanisms
and adaptive reactions of an organism functioning according to its
norm’, illness as within ‘normal physiological possibilities’, and cure
within ‘the process of the disease’ (MMPe 13–14; MMPs 13–14/11).
However, in psychiatry ‘the notion of personality makes any distinc-
tion between normal and pathological singularly difficult’ (MMPe 14;
MMPs 14/11). Third, the organic totality and psychological personal-
ity have differences with regard to milieu. No illness can be separated
from its diagnosis, process of isolation and therapy. But, if difficult in
organic pathology, it is impossible in mental pathology: ‘the reality
of the patient does not permit such an abstraction and each morbid
individuality must be understood through the practices of the milieu
with regard to them’ (MMPe 15; MMPs 15/12). This includes the
incarceration of the mad, the creation of the hysteric, the relation of
the doctor to the patient. ‘The dialectic of the relations of the individ-
ual to their milieu does not operate in the same way in pathological
physiology and in pathological psychology’ (MMPe 15–16; MMPs
15–16/13).
Taken together, this shows that a different analysis is necessary to
account for these fundamental divisions: ‘it is impossible to transpose
from one to the other the schemata of abstraction, the criteria of
normality, or the definition of the morbid individual’ (MMPe 16;
compare MMPs 16/13). We must abandon the idea of a ‘metapathol-
ogy’ and its postulates, since it is nothing but artificial [factice], ‘it is
the real man which supports its factual unity’ (MMPe 16; compare
MMPs 16/13). The approach must be grounded on ‘man itself, not
on the abstractions of illness’. When examining mental illness, it must
‘look for the concrete forms it can take in the psychological life of
an individual; then determine the conditions that make their diverse
aspects possible, and restore the whole causal system that grounds
them’ (MMPe 16–17). To discuss this different approach, Foucault
proposes a two-part study analysing ‘the psychological dimensions’
and ‘the real conditions’ of the illness (MMPe 17).
Foucault begins Part I with a chapter on ‘Mental Illness and
Evolution’. While nineteenth-century psychology tended to analyse
mental illness in a purely negative way, emphasizing the suppressed
functions, the absences and the way that ‘the patient’s consciousness
is disorientated, obscured, reduced, fragmented’, there is a need for
a more balanced account (MMPe 19; MMPs 19/16). Mental illness
paradoxically ‘effaces’ and ‘emphasizes’, ‘suppresses’ and ‘accentu-
ates’: ‘the essence of mental illness lies not only in the void that it
hollows out, but also in the positive plenitude of the activities of
replacement that fill that void’ (MMPe 20; MMPs 20/17). We need
there to find a method, a ‘dialectic’, though he immediately recognizes
that these two aspects are not simply equal: ‘the positive phenomena
of the illness are opposed to the negative phenomena as the simple to
the complex’, ‘the stable to the unstable’, and the compulsive to the
voluntary (MMPe 20–1; MMPs 20–1/18). These are differences at
the structural level, but there are also evolutionary differences, where
archaic behaviours come back to the surface in place of more recent
acquisitions (MMPe 21; MMPs 21/18–19).
These claims are developed in discussion of John Hughlings
Jackson’s 1884 Croonian lectures on the ‘Evolution and Dissolution
of the Nervous System’, and a much more sustained analysis of Freud’s

work on neuroses.36 Foucault argues that ‘the history of the libido, of
its development, of its successive fixations, resembles a collection of
the pathological possibilities of the individual: each type of neurosis
is a return to a libidinal stage of evolution’. On this basis psychoanal-
ysis thought it possible to develop ‘a child psychology by making an
adult pathology’ (MMPe 23; MMPs 23/19). Foucault then outlines
the oral, anal, mirror and phallic, and object choice stages, and cul-
minates with the Oedipal complex. While this is certainly based on
Foucault’s detailed knowledge of Freud, it likely owes something to
Lacan’s discussion of child development.37 Crucially, especially for the
importance of this notion for his later work, he concludes: ‘In short,
every libidinal stage is a potential pathological structure. Neurosis is
a spontaneous archaeology of the libido’ (MMPe 26; MMPs 26/21).
This is the first time in published work that Foucault used the term
‘archaeology’.38
Foucault then shifts to look at these issues from a sociological rather
than psychoanalytic perspective. His example is Janet, and again
there is a sense of a reverse evolution. ‘According to its seriousness,
every illness suppresses one or other form of behaviour that society
in its evolution has made possible and substitutes for it archaic forms
of behaviour’ (MMPe 28; MMPs 28/23). The examples given are dia-
logue replaced by monologue, a breakdown of the relation between
‘words, signs, rituals’ and ‘a system of meaningful equivalences’, and
a progressive detachment of the patient from a shared world and ‘the
social criterion of truth’ (MMPe 28–9; MMPs 28–9/23–4).
What both interpretations share is the sense of a progression in
standard ‘individual and social development’, an evolution due to
either Freud’s ‘libido’ or Janet’s ‘psychic force’, but which can relapse.
This ‘myth’, as Foucault calls it, is partnered by another which equates
‘the sick [malade], the primitive, and the child’. The first myth has
been abandoned, whereas the second is still current, though there are
certainly debates about how to understand it (MMPe 29–30; MMPs
29–30/24–5). Foucault therefore rejects the idea of ‘archaic personal-
ities’, and instead stresses ‘the specificity of the morbid personality’.
Regression itself is not the problem, but rather the myths associated
with it. The man does not become a child, but he may exhibit similar
forms of behaviour. What we require then is a ‘structural descrip-
tion of mental illness’ of which regression may be one aspect, but
more significantly ‘the positive and negative signs for each syndrome’
(MMPe 31–2; MMPs 31–2/25–6).
Foucault then outlines the steps of such a descriptive approach,
but notes that ‘an analysis of this type cannot exhaust the totality of
the pathological fact’ (MMPe 33; MMPs 33/27). There are two rea-
sons. First, it ignores the organizational characteristics, the residual
personality which cannot be erased: ‘The science of mental pathology
can only be the science of the ill personality’ (MMPe 34; MMPs
34/28). Second, the notion of regression describes an orientation,
but not an origin: ‘madness would be no more than a possibility, the
ever-claimable ransom of human development. . . From the point of
view of evolution, illness has no other status than that of a general
potentiality’ (MMPe 34–5; MMPs 34/28).
Foucault then shifts to biographical and psychological case stud-
ies, suggesting that work on evolution needs to be grounded in an
historical analysis. Evolution works on the basis of hierarchy, with
‘a simultaneity of the anterior and the present [actuel]’, with a move
between the two on the basis of ‘pathological regression’ (MMPe
36; MMPs 36/30). Freud, in contrast, breaks with this model he had
taken, in part, from Darwin, but his ‘stroke of genius’ was in his
ability ‘to go beyond the evolutionist horizon defined by the notion
of libido and reach the historical dimension of the human psyche’
(MMPe 37; MMPs 37/31).39
While some of Freud’s writings on sexuality relate to a psychology
of evolution, many of his other works approach the question from the
perspective of individual history. Foucault outlines some of Freud’s
case histories, including the jealous woman from the Introductory
Lectures, little Hans, and one from Henri Wallon (MMPe 37–42;
MMPs 37–42/31–5).40 He also discusses Anna Freud’s list of defence
mechanisms, which define variants of neurosis,41 and then spends some
time discussing how these manifest in different neuroses, including
the hysteric, the obsessional neurotic and the paranoiac. Regression
is therefore a defence mechanism, ‘or rather it is a recourse to the
set of protective measures already established’ (MMPe 46; MMPs
46/37–8). There is, however, an underlying crucial issue. ‘What is
the patient [malade] defending themselves against when, as a child,
they set up forms of protection that they will reveal once more in the
neurotic repetitions of their adult life?’ (MMPe 46; MMPs 46/38)
There may be something to be found in analysis of individual
cases, and Foucault’s example is that of a young girl who steals a
chocolate bar knowing she will be caught. The theft may be clumsy,
but the strategy is not– it is both for the gratification of the theft,
the attention that will come with it, and the need to feel guilty by
doing this in such a way as to be caught. ‘The pathological mech-
anism is therefore a protection against a conflict, a defence in face
of the contradiction that arouses it’ (MMPe 47; MMPs 47/38). But
he is quick to stress that not all conflicts have ‘a morbid reaction’,
it may not be pathological, and ‘it may even be the web [trame] of
all psychological life’ (MMPe 47; MMPs 47/38). Fear and anxiety
might affect ‘normal’ people, as well as patients, though the latter
seem to get caught in a ‘circular monotony’ of symptom and defence
(MMPe 50; MMPs 50/41). Work on evolution therefore needs to be
supplemented by ‘a psychology of genesis’, the individual history of a
patient (MMPe 51; MMPs 51/41–2). But even together this is insuf-
ficient: ‘The analysis of evolution situated the illness as a potentiality
[virtualité]; the individual history makes it possible to envisage it as
a fact of psychological development [devenir]. But it must now be
understood in its existential necessity’ (MMPe 52; MMPs 52/42).
Foucault contends that while ‘analysis of the mechanisms of
[mental] illness’ can explain much, it ‘leaves behind the presence
[présence] of a reality that supersedes those mechanisms and that
constitutes them in their pathological nature’. Présence, missed in the
English translation of the 1962 text, is crucial given the translation
choices made in Foucault and Verdeaux’s work on Binswanger (see
Chapter 4). Anxiety is also significant here, and it cannot be under-
stood in a simple way. Naturalist approaches miss the individual
history, yet historical approaches alone cannot account for its entirety
(MMPe 53; MMPs 53/44). The account must rather go to the heart
of the experience, with ‘a method that owes nothing to the discur-
sive analyses, the mechanistic causality, of the Naturwissenschaften;
a method that must never turn into biographical history, with its
description of successive links and its serial determination’ (MMPe
53–4; MMPs 53–4/44–5).
This approach must ‘grasp sets of elements as totalities whose
elements cannot be dissociated, however dispersed in the history they
may be’ (MMPe 53–4; MMPs 54/45). This is the approach of ‘phe-
nomenological psychology’, an understanding which ‘tries to see the
pathological world with the eyes of the patient themselves: the truth it
seeks is of the order not of objectivity, but of intersubjectivity’ (MMPe
54; MMPs 54/45). Foucault recognizes the importance of Jaspers
here, who showed that ‘intersubjective understanding may reach the
pathological world in its essence’, even if there are ‘morbid forms that
are still and will remain opaque to phenomenological understanding’.
(MMPe 55; MMPs 55/45–6). Nonetheless, he underscores that ‘the
understanding of the sick consciousness and the reconstitution of its
pathological world’ are ‘the two tasks of a phenomenology of mental
illness’ (MMPe 55–6; MMPs 55–6/46).
To understand this, Foucault breaks down the distinction
between a patient on the side of illness and yet ignorant of it, and
a doctor on the side of health, with a knowledge [savoir] of the
illness. This does not mean that their views of the illness are the
same. The patient is unable to take distance from the illness as a
process, yet their subjective experience of it remains ‘one of the
essential dimensions of the illness’ (MMPe 56; MMPs 56/47).
Foucault therefore contends that ‘phenomenological reflections
must analyse the variations of this mode of ambiguous conscious-
ness’ (MMPe 57; MMPs 57/47).42
These variations are the relation of illness to corporeal experience;
the complicated relation of the morbid process to their personality;
the creation of an autonomous world by the patient, increasingly
detached from the outside; and the patient’s immersion in it, even
if they can still grasp the world outside ‘as a distant, veiled, reality’
(MMPe 57–9; MMPs 57–9/47–9). This point is significant because,
however much it might obscure things, mental illness always has
a sense of illness, where ‘the sick consciousness is always deployed
with, for itself, a double reference, either to the normal and the patho-
logical, or to the familiar and the strange, or to the particular and
the universal or to waking and dream consciousness’ (MMPe 60–1;
MMPs 60–1/50). Yet it cannot be reduced to this sense of the illness,
but is ‘also directed at a pathological world whose structures we must
now study, thus complementing the noetic analysis by the noematic
analysis’ (MMPe 61; MMPs 61/50)
Foucault then outlines these structures, and this is where he brings
in some recent work. His first example is Eugène Minkowski’s Les
Temps vécu [Lived Time], which examined ‘disturbances in the tem-
poral forms of the morbid world’ (MMPe 61; MMPs 61/50).43 This
temporal transformation can be found in all cases: ‘each disorder
involves a specific alteration in lived time [temps vécu]’ (MMPe
62; MMPs 62/51). Foucault briefly discusses Binswanger’s Über
Ideenflucht and its discussion of the ‘flight of ideas’ of mania, where
‘time is rendered instantaneous by fragmentation; and, lacking any
opening on to past and future, it spins round upon its axis, pro-
ceeding either by leaps or by repetitions’ (MMPe 62; MMPs 62/51).
Equally, drawing on Binswanger’s analysis of the case of Jürg Zünd,
he suggests, schizophrenia can be understood ‘through the imminence
of the Sudden and the Terrifying’ (MMPe 62; MMPs 62/51).44
The second example, unsurprisingly, is space. ‘Space, as a struc-
ture of the lived world [monde vécu], lends itself to the same kind
of analysis’ (MMPe 62; MMPs 62/51). Examples include absence
or confusion over distance, where they ‘recognize here people who
they know to be somewhere else’, or who hear voices in a ‘mythical
space’ rather than the ‘objective space in which sound sources are
situated’ (MMPe 62–3; MMPs 62–3/51). Drawing on Minkowski,
Foucault suggests that ‘“clear space” blurs into “obscure space”, the
space of fear and night; or rather they come together in the morbid
world instead of being separated, as in the normal world’ (MMPe
63; MMPs 63/52).45 Another example is the relation to objects in the
world, which are detached from context and ‘instrumental relations
have disappeared’. Here, Foucault draws on Kuhn’s work on schiz-
ophrenics, ‘the importance given to limits, to frontiers, to walls, to
anything that encloses and protects’, a product of the lack of such
limits internally.46 In this, ‘objects have lost their cohesion and space
has lost its coherence’ (MMPe 63; MMPs 63/52). And as he adds,
‘the meaning of “utensility [ustensilité]” has disappeared from space;
the world of Zuhandenen, to use Heidegger’s term, for the patient is
merely a world of Vorhandenen’ (MMPe 64; MMPs 64/52).
The third example broadens the analysis further. ‘It is not only the
spatiotemporal world, the Umwelt, that, in its existential structures,
is disturbed by the illness, but also the Mitwelt, the social and cultural
world’ (MMPe 64; MMPs 64/52). This affects their relation to others,
who appear to them as strangers, detached from context, even as
objects, language seems alien or single words take on a specific impor-
tance (MMPe 64; MMPs 64/53). An alternative pathology is where
individuals encountered are ‘not simply another, but the major Other
[l’Autre majeur]. . . Each face, whether strange or familiar, is merely
a mask, each statement, whether clear or obscure, conceals only one
meaning: the mask of the persecutor and the meaning of persecution’
(MMPe 65; MMPs 65/53).
The fourth and final example concerning the individual’s own body,
which they may experience in strange ways or feel a detachment from
entirely. To the Umwelt, environment or milieu, and the Mitwelt, or
the shared world with others, is added the Eigenwelt, the one-world
or the proper world. Detachment can reach the point where ‘this life,
which is simply a consciousness of immortality, is exhausted in a slow
death, which it prepares by the refusal of all food, all bodily care, and
all material concerns’. Foucault’s example is Binswanger’s analysis of
Ellen West, whose suicide followed many years of feeling a detach-
ment from her body, exhibited either in wishing to fly or float, or in
feeling trapped, and in anorexia (MMPe 66–7; MMPs 66–7/54–5).
While there is a temptation to reduce these cases to historical anal-
yses, and to see the patient’s world as a result of those changes,
Foucault stresses that the ‘morbid world’ cannot be reduced to it.
Indeed, he suggests that any notion of ‘historical causality is possible
only because this world exists: it is this world that forges the link
between cause and effect, the anterior and the ulterior’ (MMPe 68;
MMPs 68/55). He also cites Kuhn without reference: ‘The validity of
phenomenological descriptions is not limited by a judgment on the

normal and abnormal’ (MMPe 68; MMPs 68/56).47
The question of world that Foucault introduces here, at the very end
of the book’s first part, is important. Foucault notes that Binswanger
draws on Heraclitus to talk of the shared, common world of those
awake and the individual world of those who sleep. The distinction is
the one made by Heraclitus in fragment 89 between a plural koinòn
kósmon and a singular idion kósmon. Binswanger, and Foucault
following him, see madness as akin to this distinction, the morbid is
a ‘private world’, with ‘opacity to all the perspectives of intersubjec-
tivity’ (MMPe 68; MMPs 68/56). This preceded the translation of
‘Dream and Existence’, and unlike the translation he cites the Greek
in full (D&E 126–7/179/98). This passage had previously played an
important role in Binswanger’s historical study of dreams.48
In Binswanger’s terms, the pathological process is a Verweltlichung,
a form of world-making in which the ‘nucleus of the illness is to be
found in this contradictory unity of a private world and an abandon-
ment in the inauthenticity of the world’ (MMPe 69; MMPs 69/56).
This, Foucault contends, means that we need to think about the
world and its ‘enigmatic subjectivity’, and that ‘having explored the
interior dimensions, we are necessarily led to consider its exterior and
objective conditions’ (MMPe 69; compare MMPs 69/56).49
Foucault begins the second part by claiming that evolution, history
and existence have shown ‘the forms of appearance of the disease, but
they could not demonstrate its conditions of appearance. . . It is else-
where that the pathological fact has its roots’ (MMPe 71). Drawing
on Boutroux, Foucault notes that there is a long-standing assumption
that ‘the disease has its reality and its value as disease only within
a culture which recognizes it as such’ (MMPe 71; MMPs 71/60).
Foucault sketches some comparative anthropology, including that of
Durkheim and Benedict, suggesting that in different cultures certain
behaviours are valued or excluded, privileged or repressed (MMPe
72–4; MMPs 72–4/60–3).50 Similar issues arise with village idiots and
epileptics (MMPe 74–5; MMPs 74–5/63)– a point Foucault does not
really explore here, but which links to later work on exclusion and
crime. The crucial issue here is how ‘our society does not want to
recognize itself in the patient who it rejects or locks up; at the very
moment it diagnoses the disease, it excludes the patient’ (MMPe 75;
MMPs 75/63). Psychology and sociology ‘make the patient a deviant
and seek the origin of the morbid in the abnormal’, and they do this
as ‘a projection of cultural norms’ (MMPe 75; MMPs 75/63).
This use of anthropology is revealing, for not only does it link
to his work on more philosophical reflection on the theme, but it
shows his interest in more contemporary work, something he would

rarely acknowledge in later writings. If different societies, dispersed in
geography, approach things in different ways, is it not likely that our
society, through its history, has thought and acted otherwise? This
leads him to the two questions that introduce the book’s second part:
‘how did our culture come to give illness the meaning of deviancy,
and the patient a status which excludes them? And how, despite this,
does our society express itself in the morbid forms in which it refuses
to recognize itself?’ (MMPe 75; MMPs 75/63).
Foucault now begins to use a term that he had only used once in the
first half of the book (MMPe 16; MMPs 15/12): alienation. While the
focus is ‘mental alienation’, the Marxist association is inescapable.
This part of the book was almost entirely cut in 1962. He initially ties
alienation to the ‘transformation of man into an “other” of himself’,
which he finds in antiquity and early Christianity (MMPe 76–7).
He then develops this into a broad discussion of demonic posses-
sion, across multiple centuries from the early church to Aquinas and
through to the modern period (MMPe 77–8). Christianity puts the
mentally ill outside of the human, by seeing them as demonically
possessed, and thereby part of the Christian world. ‘The work of the
eighteenth and nineteenth century is the reverse: it restores to mental
illness its human sense, but it drives the mental patient from the
universe of man’ (MMPe 78).
Foucault thus sees the eighteenth century as crucial, because it
made the claim that madness was not some supernatural imposition,
a demonic distortion of the work of God, but a human failing. In this
period, the Encyclopaedia entry on ‘madness’ uses language of priva-
tion or deprivation, illusion, error, ignorance (MMPe 78). ‘Blindness
has become the hallmark of madness, the madperson [insensé] is no
longer the possessed, they are at most the dispossessed.’ Now, ‘mad-
ness is a part of all human weakness, dementia is only a variation on
the theme of human errors’ (MMPe 79). Foucault briefly mentions
Pinel’s removal of the chains of the mad at Bicêtre (MMPe 79), an
event he will return to in later work, but he stresses here the point
he will continue to insist upon: ‘We have abandoned the demonic
conception of possession, but it has led to an inhumane practice of
alienation’ (MMPe 80).
We might think that the alienation here is just that of the aliené, one
of the words used to describe the mad. But Foucault’s point is wider.
What can happen to someone if they are deemed to have lost control
of their highest faculties? This may extend to their freedom, the lib-
erties granted by the bourgeois revolution, the Declaration of Rights.
His example is the Marquis of Espard from Balzac’s La Comédie
humaine, who had his property and parental rights removed from
him for reason of insanity. ‘The Marquis is ‘alienated [aliené]’ because
another, in his place, can exercise his rights, enjoy his property, use his
privileges, because, in summary, another has taken his place as legal
subject’ (MMPe 80). The Penal Code of 1801 is designed to replace a
de facto alienation– one of incapacity– w ith a de jure one, in which
‘the rights of the patient, which they can no longer exercise and which
may be misappropriated by another, to a legally designated person’
(MMPe 80–1).
This legal alienation is also found in ‘the later judicial practice of
voluntary internment’, though Foucault clarifies that is not always
dependent on the ‘explicit will of the patient, but dependent on that of
the family’, even if that was always intended to be ‘confirmed by med-
ical diagnosis’ (MMPe 81). The eighteenth century saw mental illness
as part of human nature; the nineteenth removes the rights associated
with that status (MMPe 81). It is this which is core to the definition
of an aliené: the capacities and rights that ‘society recognizes and
confers on every citizen’ are removed from him; ‘this alienation marks
all their social relations, all their experiences, all their conditions of
existence’ (MMPe 81). As well as a link back to possession, alienation
can be seen in various conditions including schizophrenia, psychoses,
and neuroses. Because mental illness is so inscribed into personality it
is distinct from other illnesses: ‘it involves the whole of the individual,
but if it seems to blur the entire personality, is it not to the extent that
the experience of the illness is linked to the experience of alienation in
which man loses what is most human in him?’ There may be a future
without alienation, when ‘it will be possible to envisage the dialectic
of the illness in a personality which remains human’ (MMPe 83),
but for now, alienation is ‘for the patient, much more than a judicial
status, a real experience: it is necessarily inscribed in the pathological
fact’ (MMPe 82).
This, Foucault claims, answers the first question he had posed
at the beginning of the second part. It shows how society came to
give a patient a status of exclusion. The second question remains:
if a patient is seen as foreign, a stranger or outsider to society, how
do social structures nonetheless appear in pathological experience?
(MMPe 83; see 75). To discuss this question, Foucault returns to the
theme of evolution. This approach sees regression as crucial, but this
is not the origin, ‘the real essence of the pathological’. Rather, we
should examine why society has marked the distinction so clearly that
childhood is ‘an unreal, abstract and archaic milieu, unrelated to the
adult world’. As he continues, ‘the whole evolution of contemporary
pedagogy, with its irreproachable aim of preserving the child from
adult conflicts, accentuates the distance that separates, for a man,

his life as a child to his life as a man’ (MMPe 84; compare MMPs
96/80–1). Thinking about our educational institutions and pedagogy
makes it clear that ‘pathological fixations or regressions are only
possible in a certain culture’, that ‘the neuroses of regression do not
show the neurotic nature of childhood, but they denounce the archaic
character of educational institutions’ (MMPe 84–5; compare MMPs
96/81). It is similar with social development and religious delusions.
Rather than religion being ‘delusional by nature’, Foucault suggests
that ‘religious delusion is a function of the secularization of culture’,
where certain types of beliefs can no longer be assimilated into social
structures (MMPe 85–6; MMPs 97/81).
Foucault’s next step is to bring back the theme of individual history.
This too has some merit, with ‘its traumas and defence mechanisms’,
and its relation of instincts and myths. But it too sees as the solution
what is really the problem. ‘If the disease finds a privileged mode
of expression in this interplay of contradictory behaviour, this is
not because the elements of the contradiction are juxtaposed, in a
paradoxical nature, in human unconsciousness, but only that man
makes of man a contradictory experience’ (MMPe 86; compare
MMPs 97–8/82). More crucially, ‘the social relations that determine
the contemporary economy, in forms of competition [concurrence],
exploitation, imperialist wars, class struggle give man an experience
of the human milieu which is continually haunted by contradiction’
(MMPe 86; compare MMPs 98/82). Exploitation is therefore not
just economic, but permeates social structures, the relations between
people. Foucault even suggests that the Oedipus complex is a ‘reduced
version of this contradiction’, a family version of the ‘loving hatred’
of social relations; and that while Freud thought he could explain
war through the discovery of the death-drive, it is war that actu-
ally explains a shift in Freud’s thought (MMPe 87; compare MMPs
99/83). Thus, while psychologists see ‘the conflict of instincts’ in what
they call ambivalence, Foucault indicates that its origin is really ‘in the
contradiction of social relations’ (MMPe 87; compare MMPs 99/83).
Finally, he returns to the distinction that phenomenological psy-
chology makes between the individual, private world and the shared
world. The retreat to the idios kosmos with its own constraints, is
not, itself, the real contradiction, but gives us an insight into what is.
The retreat is not trying to escape reality, but in some ways mirrors it.
With schizophrenia, for example, it is not that humans are trying to
escape the ‘mechanistic rationality’ in search of ‘joyous spontaneity’.
Rather, ‘only the real conflict of conditions of existence can account
for the paradoxical structure of the schizophrenic world’ (MMPe
88–9; compare MMPs 100/84). So, as with evolution and individual

history, we must not confuse the ‘different aspects of the disease
with its origins’, to resort to ‘mythical explanations, such as the
evolution of psychological structures, or the theory of instincts, or an
existential anthropology’ (MMPe 89; compare MMPs 101/84–5). He
stresses that ‘it is only in history that we can discover the conditions
of possibility of psychological structures’ (MMPe 89–90; compare
MMPs 101/85). But this is also a social, contextual analysis, which
recognizes that ‘our society can no longer recognize its own past’, its
‘conflictual ambivalence’ and ‘the meaning of its activity and future’
(MMPe 90).
The final chapter, ‘The Psychology of Conflict’, takes things in
a different direction. Foucault argues that ‘the contradiction in the
experience which the individual has with his milieu is not sufficient
to exhaust the reality of mental illness’ (MMPe 91). There must be
other factors at play, and Foucault indicates that the most severe
mental illnesses are not more frequent at times of war (MMPe 91).
The disease is therefore situated between ‘social and historical con-
ditions, which base psychological conflicts on the real contradictions
of the milieu’; and ‘the psychological conditions, which transform the
conflicting content of the experience into the conflicting form of the
reaction’ (MMPe 92).
Foucault suggests that Pavlov’s work is helpful here, since his phys-
iology is ‘to a large extent, an experimental study of conflict’, where
his reflexology shows that ‘any activity of the nervous system involves
both unity and opposition of two processes, excitation and inhibi-
tion’ (MMPe 92). Pavlov’s well-known work on salivation and food
showed how this can be conditioned through an associated process.
‘The spatial set of nerve structures is therefore a complex set of zones
of excitation and zones of inhibition, bound and opposed to each
other.’51 The nervous system is thus ‘a unit where the inverse process
of excitation and inhibition are kept in equilibrium’, an ‘internal dia-
lectic’ between these two processes (MMPe 93). When at the level of
the ‘overall activity of the individual’, Pavlov names this ‘dynamic
stereotype’. Foucault stresses that the point is not ‘two processes
opposed to each other’, because ‘their spatial location, their temporal
determination, the intensity of their dynamism must not be analysed
separately’, and because ‘the determination of a pattern of activity
is not done despite their opposition, but only by this opposition’
(MMPe 94). He suggests that ‘the unity of this process, which Pavlov
calls reciprocal induction, is strictly dialectical’ (MMPe 94).
With the nervous system, Foucault suggests that ‘principles of
the normal functioning’ of this system are also ‘the origin of the
athological forms of its activity’ (MMPe 94). Defence mechanisms

p
are initiated as a response to the conditions of the milieu, though are
not always triggered, and Foucault draws on some animal experimen-
tation to discuss how they might be resolved in other ways (MMPe
100–1). But there are moments where the conflicts in the milieu are
so extreme, or the capacities of the individual to respond to them are
limited, which mean that ‘the psychological dialectic of the individual
cannot be retrieved in the dialectic of his conditions of existence’
(MMPe 102). This is the real sense of being aliené, insane or alienated.
They no longer recognize themselves, and alienation ‘is no longer a
psychological aberration, it is defined by an historical moment: it is
only in that [moment] that it is made possible’ (MMPe 102).
In the conclusion Foucault suggests that his proposal is the opposite
of classical pathology. That approach takes the ‘abnormal in its pure
form as its first fact’, then ‘pathological behaviours crystallize around
the abnormal to form the disease, and the resulting alteration of the
personality constitutes alienation’. In contrast, his approach works in
reverse: ‘starting from the alienation as the original situation, discov-
ering the patient next, and defining the abnormal in the last place’.
It follows from this that ‘it is not because we are sick that we are
alienated, but one is sick to the extent that one is alienated’. Yet does
this not raise questions about the historical aspects of alienation, ‘as
an abstract notion of legal and medical practices’, as ‘a superstructure
in relation to the disease’ (MMPe 103)? Foucault avoids this by
suggesting that the historical alienation is first, and that psychological
and legal sanctions towards it follow. ‘The bourgeois revolution has
defined the humanity of man by a theoretical liberty and an abstract
equality.’ Mental illness is a challenge to this, showing that there are
contradictions in such a society, producing people whose liberty is
limited and equality compromised. Mental illness is the ‘apotheosis of
this conflict’, of the contradictions in society (MMPe 103–4); social
alienation is the condition of illness, ‘the abnormal is a consequence
of the morbid, rather than being its elemental nucleus’ (MMPe 105).
Here Foucault cites Konstantin Michaelovich Bykov from a session
of the Academy of Medicine in the USSR: ‘it is impossible to examine
the pathological processes separately from normal processes whose
basic mechanisms are the same’ (MMPe 105).52 Using Bykov is polit-
ically charged, being a use of a materialist psychology to challenge
idealist, bourgeois approaches. Foucault uses this to return to the
book’s initial claims concerning the relation of organic pathology and
mental illness. The contradictions of the milieu are crucial, and ‘it is
in this notion of functional disorder that mental pathology finds its
unity with organic pathology’ (MMPe 106). Only ‘when we link the
disease to its historical and social conditions of appearance’ can ‘we

make a truly materialist analysis’ (MMPe 107).
Foucault clarifies that the purpose of his study was not to discuss
psychological medication or interventions. But he indicates that such
approaches as electric shock, lobotomy, psychoanalysis and med-
ication will not really address the symptoms unless they recognize
the root in the ‘conflict in the human milieu’, that the disease is a
‘generalized defensive reaction’ to it, and that the therapeutic process
must aid it (MMPe 108). Essentially, psychoanalysis that does not try
to address the ‘conflictual dialectic of a situation’ will fail: there can
be ‘no possible cure when the relations of the individual and their
milieu are not addressed’, and this means that there needs to be ‘struc-
tural reform of medical assistance and psychiatric hospitals’. Foucault
points to some recent discussion of this from doctors in a special issue
of Esprit ‘devoted to psychiatry’ (MMPe 109, 109 n. 1).53
Finally, Foucault suggests that only looking at the ‘psychological
manifestations’ of mental illness, and thinking that cure is to be found
here is profoundly mistaken. We cannot simply separate the patient
from ‘their conditions of existence’ or the illness from ‘its condition
of appearance’. To do so is to retain the alienation:
True psychology must free itself from the abstractions which obscure
the truth of the illness and alienate the patient’s reality, because, when
it comes to man, abstraction is not simply an intellectual error; true
psychology must get rid of this psychologism, if it is true that, like all
sciences of man, it must have the aim of disalienation. (MMPe 110)
The book ends with a brief timeline of some important dates in

the history of psychiatry, from Pinel’s 1793 appointment to Bicêtre
to the first lobotomies and use of electric-shock treatment in 1936
and 1938. Most of the other entries note publications, including
four of Freud’s major works, as well as books by many of the figures
discussed in the text, including Janet, Bleuler, Jaspers, Pavlov and
Binswanger (MMPe 111; MMPs 105/89–90).
The only immediate critical attention was a review in early 1955
by Roland Caillois in Critique. A very positive review, it describes
the book as ‘well written and clearly thought’.54 Caillois’s objection
is to the term ‘materialism’ in psychopathology, which he suggests is
a metaphysical position not implied by the understanding. ‘The word
materialism is superfluous, though this does not detract from any
of the scientific qualities of this excellent exposé.’55 Then, in 1958,
Didier Anzieu published a short book notice.56 Anzieu had studied
with Foucault at the Lycée Henri-IV and the ENS, and became one of
France’s premier commentators on Freud, although critical of Lacan.
Finally, the series editor Lacroix, in a piece in Le Monde on History

of Madness in 1961, recalls the earlier work as ‘an excellent little
book’.57
Since 1954, as Foucault’s profile rose, more attention has been paid
to the work. But much of this has concentrated on the 1962 revision
Maladie mentale et psychologie, or seen its importance only as a
contrast to his later work. But it is equally interesting as a summa-
tion of his development until this point. Indeed Pierre Macherey has
suggested that this is the book to begin with, in its original edition, if
we want to examine ‘the archaeology of Foucault’s thought’.58 Eribon
has described it as ‘a rather modest and hesitant [demeurent] work’,59
while Macey suggests it ‘is an extraordinarily hybrid text in which
Foucault explores, but ultimately cannot reconcile, a number of dif-
ferent ways in psychology’.60 Miller claims that the book tries to do
too much in its 110 pages, and that ‘despite the book’s erudition and
evident intelligence, Foucault’s survey lacks the kind of fire and flair
readers would later come to expect from him’.61 But, while the book
was supposed to be an introduction, it was not just suitable for a stu-
dent audience. For Macey, just as Foucault had ‘used a contribution
to a history of philosophy to launch what was in effect a manifesto, he
was to use his introduction to the question of mental illness to further
a polemic and to promote his own concerns’.62
Given its proximity to his work on Binswanger, those concerns
have often been seen as furthering his interest in Daseinsanalysis. But
this is not what the book does. Foucault works through four stages
in the book’s first part, mental illness in relation to other illness, evo-
lution, individual history and existence. Only the last of these makes
reference to the work of Kuhn and Binswanger, with a single explicit
reference to Heidegger. Yet the second part of the book makes it clear
that all of these approaches fail to address adequately the question of
mental illness. In the second half of the book Foucault provides the
outline of an approach he sees as more adequate.
The focus on alienation is one indication of his Marxist approach
to these questions, even though Marx himself is not mentioned. The
historical constitution of mental illness is, as Macherey has noted,
close to Marx and Engels’s approach in The German Ideology.63 The
influence of Politzer, a PCF martyr, is also important.64 But Foucault’s
use of Pavlov is perhaps even more revealing. Pavlov plays an impor-
tant role in Merleau-Ponty’s The Structure of Behaviour, as well as
some of his lectures.65 For Eribon it ‘is a truly political marker, for in
those days Pavlov symbolized every attempt to construct the ‘materi-
alist psychological science’ demanded by the Communist party’.66 As
Eribon continues, Foucault’s formulations are ‘astonishingly close’ to
an editorial in PCF journal La Raison in January 1951, reprinted in

La Nouvelle Critique in April 1951.67 (As Chapter 2 noted, La Raison
was a journal Foucault was considering for his work.) While Pavlov
himself was not a Marxist, there are other references in the book to
Soviet scientists, including Bykov and Ivan Petrovich Razenkov. At
this time Foucault gave a lecture on Pavlov to communist students at
the Maison des Lettres, on the invitation of Althusser.68 Looking back
on this period in 1978, Foucault talked about the 1950s work trying
to elaborate a materialist psychiatry on the basis of Soviet work devel-
oping from Pavlov’s reflexology, but omits his own advocacy of this
approach (DE#281 IV, 61; EW III, 260).69 Foucault recalls that he quit
the PCF after Stalin’s death when the doctors’ plot was revealed as a
myth (DE#281 IV, 50–1; EW III, 249–50).70 The plot was reported in
January 1953, Stalin died on 5 March, charges were quickly dropped
and the public informed in April. In contrast, Althusser told Eribon
he quit because of his homosexuality;71 which might explain why
Foucault did not also break with Althusser (DE#281 IV, 51; EW
III, 250). Whatever the reason, the dates seem correct: Foucault had
membership cards from 1949 to 1953.72 Foucault wrote Maladie
mentale et personnalité in 1953, and, as Macey suggests, it ‘is some-
thing of a monument to his Party membership’.73
4
Translating Binswanger and
von Weizsäcker
On 22 September 1950, in the Amphithéâtre Descartes at the Sorbonne,

where Husserl had given his ‘Cartesian Meditations’ lectures twen-
ty-one years before, Binswanger opened a symposium on ‘Analyse
existentielle’ as part of the First World Congress of Psychiatry.1 In a
letter, Binswanger describes it as his ‘anti-Cartesian meditation’.2 An
extract was published the following year in the journal L’Encéphale.
The translator was Victor Gourevitch, but when it appeared in print
as ‘La “Daseinsanalyse” en Psychiatrie’ in 1951, the translation had
been amended by the author and Georges and Jacqueline Verdeaux.3
Jacqueline Verdeaux had previously worked with Ombredane on a
French version of Ruth Bochner and Florence Halpern’s The Clinical
Application of the Rorschach Test.4 She and her husband had known
Roland Kuhn, a Swiss psychologist, since at least 1947, and had
invited him to France, where he met Bachelard.5 The correspondence
between Binswanger and Jacqueline Verdeaux begins at the end of
1947.6 Kuhn worked at a clinic in Münsterlingen, on the shore of
the Bodensee (Lake Constance), only a few miles from Binswanger’s
clinic in Kreuzlingen. Verdeaux later recalled that it was Ombredane
who first lent her a copy of Kuhn’s book Maskendeutungen im
Rorschachsche Versuch [Mask meanings in Rorschach experiments].7
Verdeaux proposed to translate the book, and in a 1950 letter tells
Kuhn that she had finished translating the first half, and that she will
work on the second with ‘renewed courage’: ‘I am slow but tena-
cious.’8 She tells Binswanger in July 1952 she has finally finished it,
and is beginning work on Jakob Wyrsch’s 1949 book Die Person des
Schizophrenen.9 Wyrsch’s La Personne du schizophrène appeared in
Translating Binswanger and von Weizsäcker 81
1956; and the Kuhn translation followed in 1957 as Phénoménologie

du masque à travers le Test de Rorschach.10
Binswanger was known in France before the Sorbonne lecture. He
had been cited by Merleau-Ponty and in some psychiatric work by
Minkowski and Ey, with the first translation into French being his
essay on Freud in 1938.11 In 1953 Jacqueline Verdeaux contacted
Binswanger to suggest translating another of his essays as a prelude
to one of his longer case studies. Finding that the Freud essay was
already translated, she suggested ‘Traum und Existenz’, which was
initially intended for Les Temps modernes, and adds that she has
got a Belgian publisher, Desclée de Brouwer, interested in a longer
work.12 Binswanger replied to agree, and added that Ey was trying to
get an excerpt from Über Ideenflucht translated.13 Many years later
Kuhn reports Binswanger thinking that the Heideggerian ‘Traum und
Existenz’ was ‘conceived as an introduction to the method of work he
had been developing until that point’.14
Verdeaux’s work with Lacan and at the Hôpital Sainte-Anne, as
well her previous translations, meant that the psychoanalytic and
clinical vocabulary of Binswanger did not pose problems for her,
but there were greater challenges when it came to the philosophical
language, the phenomenological influences and especially Heidegger’s
work. While Kuhn had referenced Heidegger in Phénoménologie du
masque concerning angst, innerworldly being and being and appear-
ance,15 Binswanger’s text was of a different order of magnitude. As
Verdeaux was less familiar with that technical language, she turned
to Foucault for help.
As Chapter 5 will discuss in more detail, Foucault had been a
serious reader of Heidegger for some years, and this was an ideal
opportunity for him. It combined his professional interest in psy-
chology with his background in philosophy. He knew the specialized
vocabulary and had ideas of how to render it into French. Foucault
and Verdeaux are often shaping the vocabulary themselves, rather
than just making it consistent with existing works in French. Work
on the translation began at the end of 1953, and was completed in
February 1954, when a copy was sent to Binswanger.16 Though the
translation was attributed to Verdeaux alone, correspondence sug-
gests that she did the first draft which Foucault commented on and
she then edited. In a letter to Binswanger, Verdeaux praises Foucault
as ‘a precious authority from the philosophical side’.17 Her reports of
their work at the ENS further support this collaborative approach,
with long discussions of key terms.18
Foucault was credited for the notes. A few are Binswanger’s own,
though the distinction is not marked. Some of the additional notes
82 Translating Binswanger and von Weizsäcker
are simply to provide a reference: Foucault spells out that Maler

Nolten is a reference to Eduard Mörike’s novel Nolten, the Painter
(D&E 101/140/84;–/144 n. 1/–);19 or that an unreferenced quotation
is from Goethe’s Faust (D&E 103/143–4/85–6;–/144 n. 1/–).20 There
are other unreferenced quotations, which Foucault does not provide.
Another note is an editorial reference that a phrase appears in French
in Binswanger’s German text (D&E 97/134/82;–/134 n. 1/–); Foucault
also adds a reference to Binswanger’s Wandlungen in der Auffassung
und Deutung des Traumes, which is only referred to obliquely (D&E
105/146/86;–/146 n. 1/–). Two notes are, however, much more inter-
esting than these mechanical ones, because they indicate translation
choices. These notes have not been republished in this form and, since
the original translation is hard to find, I include the French text below
before a translation.
The first note, on the opening page of Binswanger’s text, reads:
Avec l’accord de l’auteur, nous avons traduit Dasein par «présence».

Bien entendu, cette traduction ne cherche pas à mettre en valeur les
coordonnées spatio-temporelles qui situeraient l’existence dans le hic et
nunc d’une objectivité; mais elle nous a semblé plus valable que l’habit-
uelle «existence» pour restituer dans sa structure significative le mot
allemande Dasein («être là»). Ce qu’exprime la «présence», n’est-ce
pas à la fois la facticité d’une existence en situation (présence ici), et,
en même temps, son ouverture sur un monde (présence au monde) ?
(D&E–/131 n. 1/–)
With the author’s agreement we have translated Dasein as ‘presence’.

Of course, this translation does not mean to foreground existence
within the spatio-temporal coordinates of the hic and nunc of objec-
tivity, but it seems more useful to us than the usual ‘existence’ in order
to give the significative structure of the German word Dasein (‘être là’
[literally, being there]). Is it not the case that ‘presence’ expresses both
the facticity of existence in a situation(presence here) a nd at the same
time, its opening to a world (presence to the world)?
In the 1971 re-edition of the text, this note is incorporated into the
glossary, with Foucault and Binswanger being acknowledged for the
formulation.21
This note indicates the remarkable translation choice, apparently
after much discussion, to render Dasein as présence.22 Dasein is a
standard German word, which means existence, and can be found in
philosophical texts before Heidegger. But in his 1927 book Sein und
Zeit, Being and Time, Heidegger uses it in a stressed way to exam-
ine the particular structures and characteristics of human existence,
their experience of being. Heidegger also uses the word Existenz, of

Latinate rather than Germanic roots, and translations usually try to
find some way of marking the distinction. For example, Heidegger
says that ‘the ‘essence’ of Dasein lies in its existence [Existenz]’.23
Heidegger importantly highlights the word’s linguistic sense of
Da-sein, literally there-being or being-the-there. While Heidegger
stressed that the ‘there’ should not be understood in a simple, spatial,
sense of location, some early translations or adaptions did use ‘être-là’
or ‘being-there’. Corbin’s 1931 translation of ‘What is Metaphysics?’
in the Bifur journal had mainly used existence, and sometimes être
present or présence, or even exister-en-fait, while his revised transla-
tion for a more widely circulated book in 1938 introduced the term
la réalité-humaine.24 That choice was indebted to Corbin’s teacher
Koyré, who also wrote a preface to the Bifur translation, and to
Kojève’s reading of Hegel.25 In 1968 Derrida described réalité-humain
as ‘a monstrous translation in many respects, but so much the more
significant’,26 and in 1999 he recalled that even as a student he already
knew it was a ‘disastrous translation’.27 However, as Baring notes,
Derrida was still using it in his courses of the early 1960s;28 though
from at least 1964 he was leaving Dasein untranslated.29 Simply
keeping the German Dasein has become standard practice in modern
English and French translations, indicating the distinctive philosoph-
ical weight Heidegger gives it. This was also the approach used in
the first French book on Heidegger, de Waelhens’s La Philosophie de
Martin Heidegger, first published in 1942.30
Binswanger adopts the distinction between Existenz and Dasein
from Heidegger, and so Foucault and Verdeaux had to face this
challenge. They translate Existenz as existence (i.e. D&E 96/133/81)
and Dasein sometimes in the same way (D&E 95/132/81; 96/133/82).
But generally, they do translate Dasein as présence. Examples include
‘Unseres Dasein’ as ‘notre présence’, ‘our Dasein’ (D&E 99/138/83);
and ‘dieses Wir, das Subjekt des Daseins’ as ‘ce nous, sujet de la
présence’, ‘this we, the subject of Dasein’ (D&E 100/139/84; see
D&E 120/169–70/95).
In his 1950 Paris lecture, Binswanger had noted that he rejects the
use of the French ‘existence’ and that he will use the German Dasein
instead. Although the symposium was on ‘Analyse existentielle’
he says it should be on ‘Daseins-analyse’. Dasein, he notes, is an
‘almost untranslatable’ word, and for the approach he even suggests
‘Analyse anthropologique phénoménologique’.31 He underlines that
‘phenomenology is the only method appropriate to anthropology’.32
By anthropology he means the same kind of thing Foucault did in his
Lille and ENS teaching, namely a science of the human in the broadest
sense, the issue of being human. One of the reasons Binswanger resists
‘existence’ is that it evokes the idea of ‘existentialism’ and, to his
mind, ‘Heidegger is an ontologist philosopher and not an existential
philosopher in the manner of Sartre.’33 The second is that ‘“Dasein”
includes the soul and the body, the conscious and the unconscious,
the voluntary and the involuntary, thought and action, emotivity,
affectivity and instinct and that an idea which includes all of this can
only be that of Being itself, to the exclusion of any qualification.’34 It
might therefore be questioned why, a few years later, he supported
Verdeaux and Foucault’s choice to render Dasein as présence.
As Henri Maldiney underlines, this term is fundamental to under-
standing the approach that Binswanger develops: ‘Daseinsanalysis
is first an analysis of the structural and temporal structures of pres-
ence.’35 However, it is worth stressing that présence is not only used
for Binswanger’s use of Dasein; for Verdeaux and Foucault it is also
the appropriate translation of Heidegger’s use. This is found when
Binswanger quotes Heidegger, and his translators adopt this term
there. One example is helpful in giving a context to Binswanger’s use
for his focus on the relation between dream and existence– T raum
und Existenz:
Hier ist, um mit Heidegger zu reden, das Dasein vor sein Sein gebracht;
es ist gebracht, insofern als ihm etwas geschieht, und als er nicht
weiss, wie und was ihm geschieht. Das ist der ontologische Grundzug
alles Träumens und seiner Verwandtschaft mit der Angst! [4] Träumen
heisst: Ich weiss nicht, wie mir geschieht.
Nous dirons ici, pour parler avec Heidegger, que la «présence est
amenée devant son être». Elle est y amenée dans la mesure où quelque
chose lui arrive et où elle ne sait pas comment cela lui est arrivé ni
même ce qui lui est arrivé. Ceci est le trait ontologique fondamental de
tout rêve et de sa parenté avec l’angoisse [1]. Rêver signifie: «Je ne sais
pas ce qui m’arrive».
To use Heidegger’s words here, ‘Dasein is brought before its own

being’– insofar, that is, as something happens to it and Dasein knows
neither the ‘how’ nor the ‘what’ of the happening. This is the basic
ontological element of all dreaming and its relatedness to anxiety or
angst [12]. To dream means: I don’t know what is happening to me.
(D&E 134/190–1/102)
It is clear that Binswanger sees this insight as profoundly signifi-

cant for his project. The notion of Angst, generally translated into
English either as anxiety or angst, is here angoisse, anxiety, anguish
or fear. Binswanger indicates that dreaming is an excellent example

of the detachment which Heidegger speaks about. The note makes
a reference to Heidegger’s 1929 text ‘What is Metaphysics?’ though
the quotation is from Being and Time.36 In the note Binswanger
comments:
Wir betrachten die Angstträume als den Prototyp der im Dasein als
solchem gelegenen existentiellen Urangst. Vgl Heidegger, Was ist
Metaphysik?
Nous considérons les rêves d’angoisse comme le prototype de l’ango-

isse existentielle originelle, déposée dans la présence en tant que telle.
(Cf. Heidegger, Qu’est-ce que la métaphysique?)
We view anxiety dreams as the prototype of the Dasein’s (as such)

primal essential anxiety. See Heidegger, What is Metaphysics? (D&E
134 n. 4/191 n. 1/105 n. 12)
Indeed, this status, which Binswanger accords the dream as ‘eine

bestimmte Art des Menschseins’, ‘une modalité particulière de l’être
humaine’, ‘a determined mode of human being’, is crucial (D&E
102/142/85). He sees the dream as an addition to Heidegger’s priv-
ileged modes of access to ontological understanding. For Heidegger
thought, as opposed to philosophy, and poetry were central.
Binswanger suggests that for insight into the ‘essential ontological
structure’ [of ‘tottering, sinking, falling’], there are three aspects:
‘Language, the imagination of the poet, and– a bove all– t he dream’
(D&E 99/137/83). Yet while this third addition to Heidegger’s pair is
Binswanger’s major contribution in the essay, Verdeaux and Foucault
push him still further. Binswanger says ‘denn die Sprache ist es, die
für uns alle “dichtet und denkt”, noch ehe der Einzelne es zum eige-
nen Dichten und Denken gebracht hat’, which we might literally
render as ‘for it is language which “poetizes and thinks” for us before
the individual themself is able to poetize and think’. Extraordinarily,
Verdeaux and Foucault chose to render ‘dichtet und denkt’ as ‘rêve et
crée’– ‘dreams and creates’ (D&E 95/132/81). A literal translation of
their translation would read ‘For it is language that “dreams and cre-
ates’ for us before the individual themself is able to dream and create’.
The second note by Foucault to the French text is also revealing
and relates to the term bestimmte cited above. Binswanger makes a
note of the distinction found ‘im Bild und in der stimmungsmässigen
Reaktion auf dasselbe’– ‘in the image and in the affective response to
the image’, which Verdeaux and Foucault render as ‘l’image et dans la
réaction thymique’ (D&E 107/151/88). They add a note at this point:
Binswanger emploie le mot Stimmung pour désigner aussi bien la col-

oration affective d’une expérience vécue que le caractère réceptif de
l’existence humaine considérée au niveau de l’existentiel ontologique
(cf. plus haut, le mot réceptivité). En effet, aucun mot français ne
nous a paru correspondre, à lui seul, à une acception aussi large, nous
l’avons traduit par ‘humeur’ chaque fois que le mot Stimmung était
analyse surtout au niveau de l’experiénce psychologique. (D&E–/151
n. 1/–)
Binswanger employs the word Stimmung to designate as much the

affective coloration of a lived experience as the receptive characteristic
of human existence– considered at the level of an ontological existen-
tial (see, above, the word réceptivité). However, no single French word
seems to correspond to this broad meaning, so we have translated
Stimmung as ‘humour’ each time the word Stimmung is analysed at the
level of psychological experience.
In the 1971 re-edition of the text, this note appears as a translator’s

note in an earlier location, with the omission of the comment on
réceptivité.37 In place of the original note, there is a cross-reference to
the earlier discussion.38
The reference to réceptivité is important in the translation of
Binswanger’s ‘Geworfensein der Stimmung’ as ‘L’Abandon à la
réceptivité’. While the French would be literally rendered as ‘the
abandonment or surrender of receptivity’, a more Heideggerian read-
ing of the German would be something like ‘the being-thrown of
mood’ (D&E 98/135/82). It is clear that the translator note shows
a deep understanding of the notion of Stimmung, even if we might
quibble with the choice of humeur as its principal translation. ‘Mood’
or ‘attunement’ are more common English renderings, and there is
arguably a lineage to more recent discussions of ‘affect’.
Yet Stimmung does not just appear as a substantive, but also as an
element within other words. The term ‘bestimmte’ and ‘stimmung-
smässigen’ were discussed above, and there are other examples. Two of
these come in the contrast between ‘Gestimmtsein’ and ‘den längeren
und tieferen Wellen der normalen und pathologischen exaltierten
und depressiven “Verstimmung”’. Verdeaux and Foucault render this
as ‘l’humeur suscitée. . . aux ondes plus longues et plus profondes
de “l’altération de l’humeur” exaltée et depressive, chez les êtres
normaux et pathologiques’. The contrast is between Gestimmtsein,
being-attuned, and ‘the larger and deeper rhythms of normal and
pathologically manic and depressive disattunement [Verstimmung]’;
which Verdeaux and Foucault put in a way which would be literally
re-translated as ‘humour aroused’ and ‘alteration of humour’ (D&E
108/152/88). Elsewhere, they translate Stimmungsgehalt as contenu

thymique (D&E 111/157/90).
Some other translation choices are also worth noting. For the
German Erlebnis they use, not the simple ‘experiénce’, but ‘l’ex-
periénce vécue’, ‘lived experience’, to stress the embedded German
word for life, Leben (D&E 95/132/81). They chose to translate the
German Trieb as instinct, instinct, rather than as pulsion, drive (D&E
132/188/101).39
One of the key aspects of Heidegger’s work is that Dasein is always
already embedded in a world– not first a subject that then encounters
a world, but his hyphenated term of In-der-Welt-Sein, being-in-the-
world. As was indicated in Chapter 2, Heidegger and Binswanger
use the term Welt, world, in compounds such as Umwelt, Mitwelt
– the surrounding world and the with-world, often translated as
environment or shared-world– and Eigenwelt, the own-world of
self-reflection. The notion of Umwelt is much used in environmental
psychology, especially in work following von Uexküll, and in French
is often translated as milieu. Yet, when Binswanger uses the phrase
‘Um- und Mitwelt’, Verdeaux and Foucault chose to render this as
‘le monde extérieur et le monde d’autrui’, literally ‘the exterior world
and the world of the other’ (D&E 96/133/81). This is arguably a
misunderstanding of both terms: the world is not exterior to Dasein,
but surrounding, enveloping, of which Dasein is an essential part.
Similarly, Mitwelt is not the world of others, but the world of our
encounter with others, shared or together. Binswanger also stresses
the importance of Mitsein, being-with or co-existence. Heidegger
begins to develop themes around this question in Being and Time,
even if his main focus is on Dasein and its engagements in the world
and with other beings as a means of access to the question of being
itself. As Maldiney puts it, the notion of with-man [Mit-Mensch]
is crucial to Binswanger, whose work is more concerned with the
inter-personal: ‘the man of the with; the man who exists to encounter.
Dasein is Mitsein.’40
There is one paragraph removed from the original 1930 version of
Binswanger’s essay in Neue Schweizer Rundschau when reprinted in
Ausgewählte Vorträge und Aufsätze in 1947.41 Although Binswanger
notes the omission in his preface to the 1947 version, it does not
appear in the French translation.42 Equally, in one passage, there
is some of the quoted Greek missing from the French translation
(D&E 126/178–9/98). Verdeaux and Foucault do not provide a crit-
ical edition, and, at times, it is even a little careless.43 Binswanger
notes that ‘psychose’ appears in place of ‘psyché’, for instance (D&E
133/190/101).44 But the challenge they faced cannot be stressed
enough. Verdeaux and Foucault were forging a path not just in the
translation of Binswanger, but also in his use of Heideggerian terms.
Introducing Binswanger
Having completed the translation, Verdeaux recalls saying to
Foucault: ‘If you like the book, do a preface for it.’ Then, while
she was in Provence on holiday over Easter 1954, she received a
large envelope. It contained a long, sprawling text, just over twice as
long as the essay it introduced. Foucault’s note simply read: ‘Here is
your Easter egg.’45 This story should be taken with some scepticism:
Binswanger knew Foucault intended to write a 100-page introduc-
tion as early as January 1954.46 In addition, as Chapter 2 discussed,
Foucault had also been teaching on Binswanger, and around this time
wrote a long unpublished manuscript on him. Defert reports that
Foucault had made some translations of Binswanger himself in 1953,
including the case study of Ilse (C18/19),47 and that he had marked
up copies of all of Binswanger’s major books.48 Rather than needing
to be persuaded by Verdeaux to write an introduction to a text for
which he had discovered a real enthusiasm, it seems that Foucault had
a wealth of material on Binswanger already prepared, and that this
project gave him a suitable outlet.
Although there has been some doubt over the date the introduc-
tion was written, Foucault sent it to Binswanger on 27 April 1954.
Easter Sunday was 18 April.49 In a letter to Binswanger accompany-
ing the text, Foucault says that he has two purposes: ‘to show the
importance of the dream for analyse existentielle’ and ‘to show how
your conception of the dream implies a complete renewal of analyses
of imagination’.50 A letter a couple of weeks later from Verdeaux
to Binswanger is somewhat horrified at the state of the text sent.
She encloses a new one, which she has ‘revised and corrected with
Foucault’. She explains that the first version was sent while she was
on holiday, and that when he sent it, ‘the poor boy was in such an
awful fatigued state that he did not revise it. . . there are so many
typing mistakes certain passages are incomprehensible’.51
Her letter crossed in the post with Binswanger’s very positive reply.
His letter to Foucault of 6 May 1954 shows that he not only read
the introduction with interest, but shared it with Kuhn and Wilhelm
Szilasi, a former colleague of Husserl and Heidegger, now living
in Switzerland.52 A few days later, on 10 May, Binswanger wrote
again, saying that Foucault had done ‘an excellent job’, which was
a ‘great scientific honour’ to him, especially praising his work on
the ‘movement of the imagination’, and extending his work on the

dream, as he had done to Freud.53 The letter goes on to note a number
of qualifications to Foucault’s introduction, which Foucault says he
will address in its revision.54 It is not clear how many actually were.
While there was a major imbalance between introduction and text,
initially it was conceived to introduce more than just ‘Dream and
Existence’: Binswanger had suggested a lecture on psychotherapy,
‘Lebensfunktion und innere Lebensgeschichte [Life Function and
Internal Life History]’ and ‘Geschehnis und Erlebnis [Event and Lived
Experience]’ as additional texts.55
Foucault begins his introduction by saying he will not simply
‘retrace. . . the path taken by Ludwig Binswanger himself’ in the essay
‘Dream and Existence’ (DE#1 I, 65; DIE 31). While he suggests that
its difficulty perhaps makes this worthwhile, he gives a programmatic
statement of the reason not: ‘Original forms of thought introduce
themselves: their history is the only kind of exegesis that they permit,
and their destiny, the only kind of critique’ (DE#1 I, 65; DIE 31). But
he does not provide that history either, suggesting that ‘a later work
will attempt to situate existential analysis within developments in
contemporary reflection on man; and try to show, by observing phen
omenology’s move towards anthropology, what foundations have
been proposed for concrete thinking about man (DE#1 I, 65; DIE 31).
Macey wonders if that work was ‘abandoned or never begun’.56
While it was certainly never published by Foucault in the form antic-
ipated here, it describes some of his teaching interests at the ENS
and Lille quite well. Indeed, it could be seen as a way of combining
the different themes, from the course on philosophical anthropology
to the material more explicitly on Husserl and Binswanger. Later
comments that he will leave an ‘issue to another time’ (DE#1 I, 67;
DIE 33) or deal with the analysis of expression in ‘future studies’
seems to hint at this project too (DE#1 I, 105; DIE 63). His letter to
Binswanger had also said that the introduction was not providing a
full theoretical introduction to Daseinsanalysis, but that this will be
provided in a future ‘broader study of anthropology and ontology’,
a link back to the publication he had claimed before in Lille, and
both of which may refer to the manuscript on Binswanger which was
analysed in Chapter 2.57
For this introduction, Foucault says its purpose is different, with
just one aim: ‘to present a form of analysis which does not aim at
being a philosophy, and whose end is not to be a psychology; a
form of analysis which is fundamental in relation to all concrete,
objective, and experimental knowledge; a form of analysis, finally,
whose principle and method are determined from the start solely by
the absolute privilege of their object: man, or rather, the being of man
[l’être-homme], Menschsein’ (DE#1 I, 66; DIE 31). Foucault follows
this with a brief mention of anthropology, saying this can be quickly
dispensed with. He makes reference here to Paul Häberlin’s work
on philosophical anthropology (DE#1, I, 66; DIE 75 n. 1).58 But it
is crucial that what he finds in Binswanger is not an anthropology
based on ‘psychological positivism’, but rather one which is situated
‘within the context of an ontological reflection whose major theme is
presence-to-being, existence, Dasein’ (DE#1 I, 66; DIE 31). He clari-
fies that this second kind of anthropology is based on an ‘analytic of
existence’, but this is precisely the kind of work Heidegger did in Being
and Time. While in there the analytic of Dasein is a mode of access to
the deeper question of being, Binswanger is arguably remaining at the
level of Dasein. Being and Time was read as an anthropology, missing
its ontological purpose. Foucault sees Binswanger as pursuing the
related project. Indeed, while Foucault says that he will later finesse
this claim, he suggests that the analysis of Menschsein ‘is nothing but
the actual [effectif] and concrete content which ontology analyses
as the transcendental structure of Dasein, of presence to the world’
(DE#1 I, 66; DIE 32). Note here that Foucault does gloss Dasein as
not simply presence, but presence to the world.
It would be possible to work through every line of this careful and
rich exposition. But the key point for Foucault is to reinforce this
stress on what Binswanger is doing. He says it would be easy to dis-
miss Binswanger’s purpose because it is not what would be expected
as either psychology or as philosophy. But this would ‘ignore the basic
meaning of the project’, which he describes as taking ‘the royal road’
in anthropology, in that sense of an analytic of the human. Foucault
underlines that Binswanger should not be seen as applying existential
philosophy to the ‘“data [données]” of clinical experience’. His work,
Foucault suggests, ‘moves continually back and forth between the
anthropological forms and the ontological conditions of existence’
(DE#1 I, 67; DIE 32). One possibility that Foucault notes would be
that his introduction works systematically through Being and Time,
which would itself have been of considerable interest, both then and
now. As Chapter 5 will discuss in more detail, Heidegger’s work was
only partly translated at this time, and a clear presentation might have
benefited French readers. It would also, today, help to make clear
just what Foucault found in Heidegger. But Foucault says this is not
necessary because we can go straight to the ‘analyses of Binswanger’.
Accordingly, his introduction only intends ‘to write in the margins of
Dream and Existence’ (DE#1 I, 68; DIE 33).
Foucault notes that this piece from 1930 is ‘the first of the texts of
Binswanger which belong strictly to Daseinsanalysis’ (DE#1 I, 68;

DIE 33), while the first text that applies it to psychopathology is Über
Ideenflucht, published between 1931 and 1933 (DE#1 I, 68 n. 2;
DIE 75 n. 5). Immediately setting up a distance from other models of
dream interpretation, Foucault underscores that here ‘dream analysis
does not stop at the level of a hermeneutic of symbols’, rather it
‘defines the concrete progression of the analysis towards the fun-
damental forms of existence’. The point is that dreams allow us to
access ‘a comprehension of existential structures’, a continual shift
which moves ‘from the cipher of the appearance to the modalities
of existence’. Yet it is not just of interest for this, just as Heidegger’s
analyses of temporality, equipment and attunement are not simply
important as modes of access. Binswanger provides, Foucault con-
tends, ‘a whole anthropology of the imagination that requires a new
definition of the relations between meaning and symbol, between
image and expression– in short, a new way of conceiving how mean-
ings [significations] are manifested’ (DE#1 I, 68; DIE 33).59 These two
aims are significant, and Foucault suggests Binswanger himself does
not always clarify their distinction or relation. But they are important
to the remainder of this introduction.
Foucault begins the second section of the essay by noting a coin-
cidence of dates: Husserl’s Logical Investigations was published in
1899 and Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams in 1900. Both of
these texts, he suggests, are an ‘attempt by man to recapture his
meanings and to recapture himself in his significance’ (DE#1 I, 69;
DIE 34). Binswanger is situated between them, though with crit-
icisms of both approaches. Foucault suggests that ‘one might say
that psychoanalysis gave the dream no status beyond that of speech
[parole], and failed to see it in its reality as language [langage]’. It is
an approach which just looks at meaning, semantics, not ‘syntactic
rules’ and ‘morphological shapes’ (DE#1 I, 70; DIE 35). As he keeps
insisting, Freudian approaches do not understand ‘the structure of
language’; it is ‘a method designed to discover the meanings of words
in a language whose grammar one does not understand’ (DE#1 I, 71;
DIE 35).
Why might this be? Foucault is explicit: ‘An inadequate elabo-
ration of the notion of symbol is doubtless at the origin of these
defects of Freudian theory’ (DE#1 I, 72; DIE 36), noting the distance
between ‘a psychology of meaning transcribed into a psychology of
language, and a psychology of the image expanded into a psychology
of fantasy’. He claimed that there was a tension in Freud’s treatment
of the Judge Schreber case,60 but that now the connection between
‘these two orders of analysis’ is being split apart. He suggests that
sychology has never been able to reconcile these splits, which he

p
suggests are exemplified by the work of Klein on fantasy, and Lacan’s
work on language and significations of existence (DE#1 I, 73; DIE
37–8). Little of Lacan had been published at this time, except in spe-
cialized journals, and while Foucault had been reading at least some
of Lacan’s work before the seminars began, this comment seems a
good indication of Foucault’s attendance. There was a discussion of
Klein by Lacan in a seminar given on 17 February 1954, for example,
just before Foucault wrote this text.61
Foucault then turns to discuss Husserl’s work in some detail; again
a move he was well equipped to make given his teaching at the time,
as well as the ‘Phénoménologie et psychologie’ manuscript. If the
dating of the related course to 1953–4 is correct, he would have
been completing it at the time of writing this introduction. Here he
principally concentrates on the Logical Investigations, identifying a
number of significant contributions. At one point he references an
unpublished manuscript from the Husserl archive, which, as Chapter
2 had noted, he had been consulting at the ENS in July 1953.62 His
criticisms relate to those of Freud, contending that ‘phenomenology
has succeeded in making images speak; but it has given no one the
possibility of understanding their language’. Foucault adds that ‘one
would not be much off the mark in defining this problem as one
of the major themes of existential analysis [analyse existentielle]’
(DE#1 I, 79; DIE 42). And it is in the combination of Freudian and
phenomenological approaches, which seeks to go beyond both, that
his distinctiveness and contribution lies: ‘Phenomenology has indeed
thrown light on the expressive foundation of all meanings [significa-
tion]; but the need to justify comprehension implies a reintegration of
the moment of objective indication on which Freudian analysis had
dwelt’ (DE#1 I, 79; DIE 42).
As he adds, the combination of phenomenology and psychoanalysis
is equipped to ‘to find the foundation common to objective structures
of indication, significant ensembles [ensembles significatifs], and acts
of expression’. This is where he situates the project of Binswanger’s
essay, a situation he acknowledges is his reading of that problem,
leaving Binswanger’s own text to pose it in his own terms (DE#1 I,
79–80; DIE 42–3).
Later sections of the essay depart even further from Binswanger,
with a literary and historical survey of quite remarkable breadth.
Some of the references he makes will be discussed below. The refer-
ences are generally tied to the question of the dream, but reach deeper
than this. The discussion of Shakespeare, for example, moves from
the disturbed sleep of the Macbeths, to the premonitory dream of
Julius Caesar’s wife Calpurnia.63 Both link the dream to distressed

sleep and death, a theme that Foucault explores with some interest.
He concludes this section with some comments on death, claiming it
‘is the absolute meaning of the dream’ (DE#1 I, 95; DIE 55). In one
of his letters to Foucault, Binswanger had encouraged Foucault to
tone this down: ‘One day you might regret the phrase. . . I think the
formulation is too exaggerated.’64
The heart of the introduction is also important for the reference to
Binswanger’s case study of Ellen West (DE#1 I, 87; DIE 49). This was
clearly a case that had particular resonance for Foucault.65 Foucault
mentions the case in publications (MMPe 66–7; MMPs 66–7/54–5;
DE#1 I, 104–5, 107–8; DIE 62–3, 64–5) and he also discussed it in
an unpublished manuscript (see Chapter 2). Here, Foucault sees this
case significantly in terms of spatiality, temporality, authenticity and
death. He suggests that, for her, ‘the solid space of real movement,
the space where things come to be, has progressively, bit by bit, dis-
appeared’. This closing in of space is significant, where ‘the existential
space of Ellen West is that of life suppressed, at once in the desire for
death and in the myth of a second birth’. This explains her suicide,
which he describes as the ‘culmination [réalisation] of her existence’
(DE#1 I, 105; DIE 63). He equally sees this in terms of time. Instead
of looking back at her past in a positive way, it becomes something
to be suppressed with a wish for a new birth. As a later note specifies,
‘In certain schizophrenics, the theme of suicide is linked to the myth
of a second birth’ (DE#1 I, 113 n. 1; DIE 78 n. 66). Rather than
living forward, to a ‘future as disclosure of a fullness and anticipation
of death’, she experiences death continually in the present. Hence
the anorexia, which was to deny the body its life, and her eventual
suicide. Prior to this her ‘temporalization of existence’ had been that
of ‘inauthenticity’ (DE#1 I, 107–8; DIE 65). The language of authen-
ticity and inauthenticity is perhaps more Sartrean, the German terms
in Heidegger and Binswanger having more of a sense of appropriate
and inappropriate, that is what is proper to one’s own being.
Suicide is a theme that Foucault discusses in some detail, perhaps
for personal reasons, though there is also a link to the project on
the history of death he had planned with Verdeaux (see Chapter 6).
Foucault suggests that ‘suicide is not a way of cancelling the world or
myself, or the two together, but a way of rediscovering the original
moment in which I make myself world, where nothing is anything in
the world’ (DE#1 I, 113; DIE 69).
As he brings his essay to a close, Foucault reverses the idea that the
dream is constituted by ‘an archaic image, a phantasm, or a heredi-
tary myth’. Instead, he suggests that ‘every act of imagination points
implicitly to the dream. The dream is not a modality of the imagina-

tion, the dream is the first condition of its possibility’ (DE#1 I, 110;
DIE 66–7). This is a fundamental claim, which links the reading back
to the idea of a project in fundamental ontology. It also marks out
clearly the distance from both Freud and Husserl. Such a sense is
reinforced in the last lines of the introduction devoted to Binswanger,
in which he suggests that this work took the key step of analysing a
dream ‘with the goal of bridging that distance between image and
imagination, or, if you will, of effecting the transcendental reduction
of the imaginary’. He adds that ‘it is essential that this transcendental
reduction of the imaginary ultimately be one and the same thing as
the passage from an anthropological analysis of dreams to an onto-
logical analytic of the imagination’. This is how Binswanger makes
the shift ‘from anthropology to ontology’, which he sees as ‘the major
problem of Daseinsanalysis’ (DE#1 I, 117; DIE 73).
Pinguet recalls that Foucault found it amusing to have published
an essay over twice as long as the text it introduced.66 Yet it is more
than just an introduction. Right at the end, following some discussion
of René Char’s Partage Formel [Formal Division], Foucault again
indicates a wider project:
But all of this has to do with an anthropology of expression which

would be more fundamental in our sense than an anthropology of the
imagination. We do not propose to outline it at this time. We only
wanted to show all that Binswanger’s text on the dream could bring to
an anthropological study of the imaginary. What he brought to light
regarding dreams is the fundamental moment where the movement
of existence discovers the decisive point of division [partage] between
those mages in which it becomes alienated in a pathological subjec-
tivity, and expressions in which it fulfils itself in an objective history.
The imaginary is the milieu, the ‘element’, of this choice. Therefore,
by placing at the heart of imagination the meaning of the dream, one
can restore the fundamental forms of existence, and one can reveal its
freedom. And one can also designate its happiness and its unhappiness,
since the unhappiness of existence is always writ in alienation, and
happiness, in the empirical order, can only be the happiness of expres-
sion. (DE#1 I, 119; DIE 74–5)
This is a curious passage which further departs from Binswanger’s

own approach and becomes increasingly speculative. The use of the
term ‘alienation’, with its unmistakable Marxist overtones, makes a
link back to the project of Maladie mentale et personnalité. These
were the last words Foucault published in this early period. They hint
at a project that he never completed; a path he decided not to take. As
Foucault wrote in the copy of the book he gave to Hyppolite, ‘these

pages, if a little psychological, nonetheless serve as the pretext for
philosophy’.67
Beyond his impressive knowledge of Binswanger, the introduction
displays an extraordinary breadth of learning. Macey has called it
‘a virtuoso display of the erudition of the agrégé de philosophie’.68
A number of philosophical figures are mentioned or quoted, includ-
ing Heraclitus, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Quintilian, Leibniz, Spinoza,
Kant, Schelling, von Herder, Husserl and Heidegger. In his use of the
phenomenological tradition, Foucault is identifying key influences on
Binswanger’s work, even though these figures were relatively little
known in France at the time. Even though Foucault was usually
dismissive of him, in this essay he positively engages with Sartre’s
work on The Imaginary, though not without some questions (DE#1
I, 110; DIE 67).69 Yet it is not just the major figures of this move-
ment. The discussion of spatiality, as well as drawing on Binswanger’s
‘Das Raumproblem in der Psychopathologie’ (DE#1 I, 103; DIE 67),
also brings in the important work of Becker on geometry (DE#1 I,
101; DIE 60).70 Foucault also shows a familiarity with the work of
Henricus Cornelius Rümke, and Husserl’s last assistant, Fink, who
would go on to an important career in his own right (DE#1 I, 104;
DIE 62).71 He also mentions Szilasi, whom he later met through his
contact with Binswanger (DE#1 I, 111; DIE 68).72
He is equally as comfortable with the psychological and psycho-
analytical references, from Freud, Jung and Jaspers to the more
contemporary Erwin Straus, Klein and Lacan. Much of this work
was read in German, since so little was translated at the time. But,
as Macey underscores, as well as showing ‘the traditional repertoire
of the academic philosopher’ and his membership of the ‘rising gen-
eration’, there were also a range of literary references, often quite
obscure and from the period Foucault would later call ‘the classical
age’.73 These figures include the well-known Shakespeare and Racine,
but also Théophile de Viau, François Tristan L’Hermite, Antoine
Arnauld, Isaac de Benserade, Cyrano de Bergerac, Célestin de Mirbel
and Louis Ferrier de la Martinière. Later figures mentioned include
Novalis, Friedrich Hebbel, Victor Hugo, Stefan George and Jean
Cocteau. This blend of philosophy, psychology and literature paves
the way for his later work.
Foucault also mentions the role that Bachelard’s work on the
imagination plays (DE#1 I, 114; DIE 70).74 Foucault’s interest in
Bachelard was not just mediated through Canguilhem and the history
of the sciences (see Chapter 1), but also in the work on imagination,
the elements, reverie and poetics. Bachelard and Binswanger had long
been reading each other and corresponding, with the former’s work
on reverie being important for the latter.75 Verdeaux took Foucault
to meet Bachelard while they were working on the translation.76
This was the beginning of a correspondence between Bachelard and
Foucault, culminating in Bachelard’s praise of Histoire de la folie,
shortly before his death.77
The thoroughness with which Foucault approached his reading
did not extend to his referencing. The introduction and translation
of Binswanger are prefaced by a passage from Char (DE#1 I, 65; DIE
30). Foucault does not provide a reference, but it is section XXII.78
Then, towards the end of the introduction, Foucault quotes Char
four times. The third and fourth times he provides no reference, and
does not even set Char’s words in quotation marks on the third. With
the second, he provides a reference, but it is incorrect: he references
section LV when it should be XVII.79 Only for the first is the reference
correct. For Macey, this was ‘a regular failing on Foucault’s part. . . a
very early instance of the author’s notoriously cavalier attitude to the
use of quotations and references’.80
The section of Char used for the epigraph of the Binswanger essay
is not quoted in full. Foucault abbreviates it by cutting one whole sen-
tence and half of the next, substituting an ellipsis and then beginning a
new sentence with the second half of one of Char’s. He also omits the
short second paragraph of Char’s section. In the History of Madness
some years later, Foucault closes the book’s original preface with the
second paragraph of this same section: ‘Companions in pathos, who
barely murmur, go with your lamp spent and return the jewels. A new
mystery sings in your bones. Cultivate your legitimate strangeness’
(FD1, xi; DE#1 I, 167; HM–/xxxvi).81 In 1961 Foucault does not
even mention Char, much less give a reference. But it is intriguing
that he would close the preface to the History of Madness with the
end of the passage he had used to begin the Binswanger introduction.
The preface to the History of Madness was the last part of the text
he wrote, dated 5 February 1960. Between Easter 1954 and February
1960, then, Char is used to bookend his work on these questions. Put
the two quotations of Char together– a s indeed Foucault did at the
end of the draft manuscript of the Binswanger introduction– a nd you
have the beginning and end of the passage, save for the short ellipsis
in the first quote.82 It is as if the entirety of the work by Foucault in
this period is written into the gap between the two parts of Char’s
passage.
Dating and Legacy

Both Maladie mentale et personnalité and the French translation of
Binwanger have publication dates of 1954. The copyright page for
Maladie mentale says ‘second quarter [trimestre] 1954’, and Defert
dates it to April 1954, saying that the manuscript was completed in
the winter of 1952–3 (C 19/20). Pinguet puts it a bit later, saying that
the book was written in 1953 in the ENS office in the rue d’Ulm.83 Defert
adds that the Binswanger translation was published ‘at almost the
same time’ (C 19/20), and the book does have a 1954 copyright date.
This has led to some uncertainty about the sequencing of publication
and writing, but archival and other sources can resolve this.84
Correspondence from Lacroix and the press to Foucault indicates
a commission for Maladie mentale et personnalité in February 1953,
a contract on 30 March and receipt of the manuscript in October.85
Foucault received a cheque on 30 April 1954 from PUF for the first
1,500 copies printed.86 The printing therefore preceded the writing of
the Binswanger introduction, which can be precisely dated to Easter
1954. Verdeaux tells Binswanger in a June 1954 letter that ‘Dream
and Existence’ would be published on 15 September that year.87
Publisher problems meant that printing did not even begin until
December, and Binswanger only received copies in March 1955.88
Additionally Lacroix, the series editor of Maladie mentale et person-
nalité, clearly indicates in his review of History of Madness that the
book he commissioned appeared first, and the Binswanger translation
‘a little later’.89
As Macey adds, ‘both texts provide answers to the problem raised
at the end of “La Psychologie”’.90 This reinforces the sense that this
essay was the first to be written. Questions of dating are significant,
given the difference in tone, style and project across these pieces. The
discussion here has followed the most compelling order. The two
essays published in 1957 were written first, with ‘La Psychologie de
1850 à 1950’ preceding ‘La Recherche scientifique et psychologique’;
around the same time as the Maladie mentale et personnalité book;
followed by the Binswanger introduction.
Miller adds that Foucault’s attitude to the Binswanger introduction
differed from his view of Maladie mentale et personnalité in one
other crucial respect. As Chapter 8 will discuss in detail, Foucault
attempted to prevent the republication and translation of the book,
rewriting parts for a new edition in 1962 and then letting it go out of
print. In contrast, Forrest Williams suggests Foucault did not simply
agree to an English translation of the Binswanger essay, but was even
enthusiastic: they had begun a conversation on the introduction in

1983 during Foucault’s visit to the University of Colorado, and had
intended to continue discussions in Paris in July 1984.91 Foucault’s
death in June 1984 meant that the translation appeared posthumously.
As Macey notes, Le Rêve et l’existence was not a great suc-
cess. ‘Foucault was completely unknown, and Binswanger himself
was something of an unknown quality in Paris.’92 Verdeaux told
Binswanger that despite the lack of publicity, 500 copies of a print
run of 3,000 were sold in two months, but that seems to have been
the limit.93 A few years later the unsold copies were pulped.94 It did
not receive much attention in journals, with only two discussions in
the 1950s. One was in an essay by Ey in L’Évolution psychiatrique in
1956, which mentions Foucault’s ‘magnificent and substantial intro-
duction’.95 In 1959 Robert Misrahi belatedly reviewed it in Revue de
métaphysique et de morale.96 Misrahi describes the importance of the
introduction, outlining in some detail its conceptual moves and the use
Foucault makes of Binswanger’s text. However, it criticizes Foucault’s
reading of Sartre, noting that it makes no reference to the Sketch for
a Theory of the Emotions, and suggesting that Sartre clearly opposes
psychology and anthropology.97 Indeed, much of the discussion sug-
gests that Sartre should have been a much more frequent reference,
although Misrahi also faults Foucault for not discussing Politzer’s
work.98 Yet, as previous chapters noted, Politzer was an influence and
reference in Foucault’s teaching and Maladie mentale et personnalité,
and Foucault had distinguished Binswanger’s project from that of
Sartre. The review also makes the strange designation of Foucault
first as a working ‘like an historian’, then he is described as an histo-
rian, and then finally as a ‘Marxist philosopher’.99 Misrahi however
does agree with Foucault– w ho is himself following Heidegger and
Binswanger’s approach– that philosophy must begin by being an
anthropology before becoming an ontology, and finally ‘an ethics of
history and historicity’.100 Yet what is perhaps most interesting about
this review is that it is much more about Foucault than Binswanger
and, as well as being the most significant discussion of the introduc-
tion, is the first sustained engagement with Foucault’s work at all.
Of course, since Foucault’s profile rose, the limited attention to this
text has changed somewhat, though it remains a neglected part of his
work.101
Foucault, Georges and Jacqueline Verdeaux visited Binswanger and
Kuhn in Switzerland in March and September 1954.102 These were
important for work discussions, with the first to Kreuzlingen, and
the second to Brissago. Binswanger said of the first that the visit was
‘a great pleasure’ and that Foucault gave ‘a very good impression. . .
especially since he is extremely knowledgeable’.103 On Mardi Gras,

2 March, they also attended a ‘fête des fous’, a carnival parade of
the mad, in Münsterlingen, a festival with roots back to the Middle
Ages.104 The ceremony had the patients, along with their doctors
and nurses in costumes and elaborate, over-sized masks. The masks
obscured their identities, as well as representing a carnivalesque atti-
tude. Their style is closer to Punch and Judy than a masked ball. All
paraded from the hospital to the local village hall, led by the figure of
Carnival. At the end of the evening they burnt the effigy of Carnival
and the masks in a large bonfire.105 One of the most intriguing publi-
cations from the archive recently has been Foucault à Münsterlingen,
a documentary and photographic report of that visit.106
While significant, and perhaps an inspiration for the ship of fools
in Histoire de la folie,107 Foucault only refers to this in oblique ways.
In 1963 he took part in a radio discussion, where he discusses with
Jean Doat the contrast between theatre and festival in their relation
to madness (LMD 28/7). The festival, fête, is a more carnivalesque
celebration than the controlled representation of theatre. A more con-
crete reference comes in 1976, when Foucault contrasts a film with
the fête des fous that took place in some Swiss psychiatric hospitals
and I think in certain areas of Germany: the day of the carnival, the
mad disguised themselves and went into town, of course not the ones
who were gravely ill. They acted out a carnival where the population
watched from a distance and with some trepidation, and it was ulti-
mately rather terrible that the only day they were permitted to go out
together en masse was the day they had to disguise themselves and
literally act mad, like how non-mad people act mad. (DE#171 III, 62;
see DE#162 II, 804–5)108
Verdeaux continued work on Binswanger, translating a short address

for the 1954 International Congress of Psychotherapy in Zurich on
Binswanger’s commission with Foucault’s help,109 and one of the case
studies on schizophrenia, the case of Suzanne Urban.110 Her plans
were to do the other case studies after this.111 Correspondence shows
Suzanne Urban was begun in 1954, in parallel with the final work on
‘Dream and Existence’.112 Foucault was initially involved, deciding
with Verdeaux that it should be a single volume, along with an
introduction and a ‘kind of small glossary of anthropo-phenomeno-
logical terms’. The September 1954 visit was to discuss some of this
vocabulary.113 Basso has suggested that Foucault and Kuhn should
share the translator credits for this work; though it is again credited
to Verdeaux alone.114 Binswanger’s preface to the translation simply
thanks them as his ‘friends’ for their ‘precious advice’.115 The move to
Uppsala seems to have been the break. The only contact after this was
a note from Foucault thanking Binswanger for sending him a copy of
his Erinnerungen an Sigmund Freud in 1956.116
Foucault’s contact with Kuhn seems to have stopped entirely– the
last trace is a postcard sent by Kuhn to Binswanger from Paris, to
which Foucault, Georges and Jacqueline added greetings.117 Kuhn
discovered the anti-depressant properties of the drug Imipramine in
1956, which had initially been proposed as a treatment for schizo-
phrenia. While the drug failed to address the psychotic symptoms,
Kuhn recognized its other effects and was the first to publish results
of its use.118 A critique of unethical testing by Kuhn at this clinic
has recently been published, drawing on the papers in his extensive
archive.119 While this postdates his links to Foucault, the Verdeaux
couple did some testing in Paris for Kuhn and R. Oberholzer of Geigy,
a Swiss pharmaceutical company.120
In 1971, Verdeaux was the lead translator of a collection of
Binswanger’s work, which appeared in the Arguments series edited
by Axelos with Les Éditions de Minuit.121 The 1954 translation of
‘Dream and Existence’ is reprinted in this collection, along with some
of the texts Binswanger had suggested back in 1954.122 Foucault’s
role goes unmentioned: even his notes are now incorporated as either
translator notes or into the glossary. Verdeaux’s later translation
projects seem to be disconnected from the psychological works–
they include writings on theatre, libretto and ethnography. Foucault’s
links to the Verdeaux couple end in the 1960s.
Foucault discussed this work in a wide-ranging interview in 1978.
He is asked about ‘phenomenological anthropology and the attempt
to associate phenomenology and psychoanalysis’. The Binswanger
introduction is the explicit reference, but the remit is wider. Foucault
replies:
My reading of what was called ‘existential analysis’ or ‘phenomenolog-

ical psychiatry’ was important for me during the time I was working in
psychiatric hospitals and while I was looking for something different
from the traditional schemas of the psychiatric gaze, with the problem
of the classification of diagnostic techniques, etc. All this psychiatric
grid, I vaguely sensed I had to get rid of it, and I needed a counterpoint.
There’s no doubt that those superb descriptions of madness as unique
and incomparable fundamental experiences were important.
The work he did in the clinical setting is clearer in the transcript than
the slightly truncated published version. Foucault goes on to say:
And I believe that [R. D.] Laing was impressed by all that as well; for a
long time he also took existential analysis as a reference (he in a more
Sartrean and I in a more Heideggerian way). But we moved on to other
things. Laing developed a colossal project connected with his work
as a doctor; together with [David] Cooper, he was the real founder
of antipsychiatry, whereas I only did a critical historical analysis. But
existential analysis helped us to delimit and get a better grasp on what
was heavy and oppressive in the gaze and the knowledge apparatus of
academic psychiatry. (DE#281 IV, 58; EW III 257–8)123
Macey has also suggested that the introduction to the Binswanger

translation is the ‘best indication of where Foucault’s intellectual
interests lay in the early to mid 1950s’.124 Indeed it really is the defin-
itive published statement of where his enquiries into psychology and
its relation to philosophy and anthropology– all key themes in his
Lille and ENS lectures– had led him. It is this text, much more than
the two essays published in 1957 or Maladie mentale et personnalité,
that points the way to the work he would produce in the subsequent
decades. It connects to the work of the 1960s on literature, for exam-
ple, and Gros-Azorin sees a lineage from these ideas to Foucault’s
work on heterotopias.125 More crucially for the account here, Basso
has suggested that this interest in Binswanger was far from a ‘misstep’
in Foucault’s career, but that the concerns link to the work that went
into History of Madness.126 Yet, as subsequent chapters show, the
path there is not straightforward– the ‘later work’ mentioned in the
introduction was never published, and his enquiries went down many
detours.
Translating von Weizsäcker

While Foucault’s role in the Binswanger text is fairly well known,
his role as a co-translator of a text by Viktor von Weizsäcker, Der
Gestaltkreis, is rarely discussed at all.127 Von Weizsäcker was a
physician and neurologist, who became Professor of Neurology and
Director of the Institute of Neurological Research in Breslau, for-
merly in Germany, and now Wrocław in Poland. He came from an
elite family. His brother was the naval officer and Nazi diplomat
Ernst von Weizsäcker; and Viktor was therefore the uncle of future
President of Germany, Richard von Weizsäcker and the physicist Carl
Friedrich von Weizsäcker. In his work he was critical of claims of a
pure, objective science, and played a crucial role in the development
of ‘psychosomatics and social medicine’.128 Von Weizsäcker, who
died in 1957, was one of the founders of medical anthropology.129
Quite how Foucault came to be involved in the translation is

unclear.130 Daniel Rocher, his co-translator, was also a former phi-
losophy student from the ENS. The translation was published on 3
February 1958, but was completed earlier. Foucault first mentions
the translation as complete as part of his publication reports for
Lille,131 though correspondence with Desclée de Brouwer shows that
the two parts of the translation were not received until late 1954.132
Defert’s report that Foucault was still working on it while in Uppsala
in March 1956 (C 21/23) therefore probably refers to a later stage in
the book’s production process.
The German text was first published in 1940; the translation is
of the 1948 fourth edition. While the second and third editions had
brief prefaces, the text was substantially the same, with just some
additions to the notes (GK 4–5/34, 5/34–5). The fourth edition had
a much more substantial preface (GK 6–22/19–31). Von Weizsäcker
stresses that the preface is not an attempt to rewrite the work, but to
indicate some marginal thoughts concerning themes to which he has
returned and others that have arisen since its first publication (GK
7/20). The translation appeared in the Desclée de Brouwer series on
‘Bibliothèque neuro-psychiatrique de langue française’, which had
also included Kuhn’s Phénoménologie du masque and Binswanger’s
Le Cas Suzanne Urban, as well as works by Ey, Lacan, Minkowski
and Françoise Minkowska.133
Ey provides an introduction to the von Weizsäcker translation.134 Ey
was a major figure in French psychiatry for almost fifty years, though
there were tensions between him and Lacan.135 Lacan’s thoughts on
von Weizsäcker are not known, but there are certainly some links
between Ey’s project and that of the German. Foucault would have
heard Ey lecture at Sainte-Anne,136 and Ey may have brought him into
the project.137 Binswanger occasionally references von Weizsäcker in
his work;138 and, as Gros suggests, they both have an interest in illness
as a creation of phenomena.139 Canguilhem also sometimes referenced
von Weizsäcker’s work.140
The translation is interesting in multiple ways. It begins with the
title– D
er Gestaltkreis. Foucault and Rocher render this as Le Cycle
de la structure. The cycle of structure is rather a restrictive translation
of Gestalt, which is often untranslated. Gestalt literally means shape
or form, but it has a specific sense in psychology, where it is used
to describe the way that the mind forms a coherent whole, which is
not simply the combination of individual perceptions or reactions.
Indeed, it is Kurt Koffka, one of the founders of Gestalt psychology,
who made the claim that ‘the whole is other than the sum of the parts’;
suggesting that this was a more accurate claim than it being ‘greater
than the sum’.141 For Koffka, the point was difference, not excess.
While the projects should not be conflated, there is a resonance. As
Ey stresses, for von Weizsäcker it is not ‘a simple structure in a circle
[structure en cercle] (Kreisgestalt), but a ‘Gestaltkreis’, that is a cycle
of structure [cycle de la structure]’.142 While ‘structure’ as a choice is
not in itself inaccurate, it certainly fails to capture the specific sense
of the German term. Indeed, in the preface to the fourth edition, von
Weizsäcker notes that the term had an aspect and advantage he was
not initially aware of: it does not imply a precise ‘cyclic structure
[Kreisgestalt]’, but something that is not yet achieved. ‘This is the
internal conflict between the perceptible [sensible] image (suggested
by the words ‘structure’ and ‘cycle’), and the concept without figure
which produces the composition of these two words’ (GK 6/19).
The subtitle is also significant– t he book offers a theory that unifies
perception and movement– elements of the psychological and the
physiological. While this is therefore a work developing both psy-
chology and physiology, the literature upon which von Weizsäcker
draws is much wider. The work included in this book is, he says, not
something that can be labelled ‘biology, psychophysics or philosophy
of nature’, but a development of themes in each of these domains in
relation to ‘experimental research, as well as an attempt to base new
pathological and medical research on new foundations’ (GK 17/27).
In his terms, Gestaltkreis connects with biology, medicine and philos-
ophy (GK 22/30).
Von Weizsäcker’s resources include the work of biologists such as
Hans Driesch and von Uexküll. In addition, he draws on concepts
from philosophy, like ‘form, movement, object [Gegenstand], etc.’
and some from ‘philosophy of nature, such as space, time, function’
(GK 21/30). Husserl and Heidegger are also important to his project,
which may explain Foucault’s role in the translation and interest in
the text. Ey thinks it is remarkable that the only French authors men-
tioned are Bergson and Sartre, and suggests that Merleau-Ponty may
have been an inspiration.143 Yet, as von Weizsäcker notes in his 1946
preface to the third edition, some of the key works, including Sartre’s
1943 Being and Nothingness, were published after the first edition
of 1939 (GK 5/34–5). Merleau-Ponty’s The Structure of Behaviour
first appeared in 1942, and Phenomenology of Perception not until
1945. Add the complications of printing and intellectual exchange
during the war, and it makes more sense to imagine a partly shared
intellectual project and references, than straightforward influence.
Yet this does not mean that the approaches are the same. In the third
edition, von Weizsäcker suggests that Sartre’s book fills out what was
only an ‘anticipation’ in his own work, but adds rather cuttingly that
this is ‘with the brilliant and decisive energy available to the philos-
opher who is better protected from the inextricable entanglement of
empirical relations’ (GK 5/34–5).
One of the most important aspects of von Weizsäcker’s work is
that he broadens the psychological sense of Gestalt to encompass
physiological issues, notably movement. He sees perception and
movement as being flexible responses, not fixed, and reworked and
tuned through experience. His focus on movement includes the nerv-
ous system and motor functions. Hence the book’s first theme is
‘movement of living beings [lebender Wesen/êtres vivants] but not
just any bodily or purely imaginary movement in the spatio-temporal
system’ (GK 23/37). The focus is rather on self-movement ‘spontane-
ity or auto-mobility [Spontaneität, die Selbstbewegung/spontanéité,
“auto-mobilité”]’ (GK 23/37). He notes that ‘this implies that we
admit the existence of a subject, of an active being for themselves and
for their own ends’ (GK 23/37). He argues that ‘to study the living
being, we must take part in life’. He is interested in life in its broadest
sense, from birth to death (GK 3/33). ‘Biology’, he says, ‘is science of
forms or typology [Formenkunde]’ (GK 198/170).
His focus requires him to discuss space and time in some detail, as
a way of making sense of the encounter of the living being with their
environment. Indeed, in the book’s only diagram, von Weizsäcker
puts the two in direct relation– O rganismus [O] and Umwelt [U]
(GK 200/171).144
This circle is, von Weizsäcker stresses, closed, a cycle which does
not have an exterior or an entry/exit point. He says that ‘we call the
genesis of the forms of the movement of organisms the Gestaltkreis’,
the term which Foucault and Rocher translate as cycle de la struc-
O U
Source: Victor von Weizsäcker, Der Gestaltkreis

ture (GK 200/171). As do so many other theorists of this relation,

von Weizsäcker draws upon von Uexküll’s work on the Umwelt. In
distinction to the translation of Binswanger, Foucault and Rocher
translate this sometimes as milieu or monde environnant– milieu or
environing world (GK 237/197; see 32/44; 31/43 etc.); though when
Umwelt is contrasted with Eigenwelt, own or self-world, they trans-
late as ‘l’univers environnant et l’univers propre’ (GK 24/38).
In understanding this spatial sense of a milieu, a key theme of
the book is ‘orientation in space’ (GK 12/23), and von Weizsäcker
stresses that we ‘must distinguish between physical-mathematical and
biological integration of space’ (GK 36/47). As he expands:
Physical–mathematical integration has a system of references constant

in time. Its coordinates must be in a state of total immobility, and
all bodies which refer to it are thus without contradiction between
themselves. Biological integration only has a momentary value
[Augenblicksgeltung/valeur momentanée]; its ‘system of references
[Bezugssystem/système de références]’ can certainly have a certain
duration, but also in each moment it can be sacrificed in favour of
another. It is not therefore a system strictly speaking, but an arrange-
ment [Einordnung/agencement] of biological operation in the present.
(GK 36/47)
In common with Husserl, Heidegger and many who came after

them, von Weizsäcker argues that lived space needs to be opposed to
mathematical space (GK 214–15/180–1) ‘If space is only biologically
determined in relation to time, there follows from this– as with bio-
logical time– a net difference in structure from mathematical space’
(GK 215/180).
Yet it is worth underlining that space is not a theme for him just
in relation to physiology, but also in terms of psychology, with a
stress on the importance of spatial aspects of perception as much as
temporal ones (GK 159–60/142–3). He argues that space and time
take their order from a situation [Situation/situation] and event or
appropriation [Ereignis/événement]. So, rather than an event or situ-
ation being located in space and time, they give rise to its definition
and form. ‘Things are not in space and time, but space and time
arise in the development of the happening [Geschehens-Fortbildung/
la continuité des événements] and are thus founded in, or on, things.
The world and things in it are not in space and time, but space and
time are in the world, in its things’ (GK 175–6/154).
Indeed, in the note he provides here, von Weizsäcker quotes
Heidegger on space, a passage that is interesting for Foucault and
Rocher’s translation of Dasein by présence, as with Binswanger:
Der Raum ist weder im Subjekt, noch ist die Welt im Raum. Der Raum
ist vielmehr ‘in’ der Welt; sofern das für das Dasein konstitutive In-der-
Welt-Sein Raum erschlossen hat.
L’espace n’est pas dans le sujet et le monde n’est pas dans l’espace.
L’espace est bien plutôt dans le monde; dans la mesure où l’être dans le
monde, constitutif de la présence, a ouvert l’espace. (GK 287 n. 15/154
n. 1)145
In English, Heidegger’s lines would read
Space is not in the subject, nor is the world in space. Space is rather ‘in’
the world, to the extent that space is disclosed by being-in-the-world,
which is constitutive of Dasein.
It is important to underscore that Foucault and Rocher grasp

the importance of the complicated notion of Ereignis, which von
Weizsäcker uses in a Heideggerian way. However, they rather muddy
the waters by the same French word, événement, for Geschehens,
which has a similar sense in an unstressed way, but is for Heidegger
what happens.
There are only two brief translator notes from Foucault and
Rocher, both of which say the same thing, that the French perce-
voir, to perceive, translates the German Wahr-nehmen, ‘literally take
for true [or real– v rai]’.146 Accordingly, they translate the crucial
Wahrnehmung as perception– one of the two key terms of the work
along with Bewegung, mouvement. Von Weizsäcker also uses the
compounds Selbstbewegung [automouvement– self-movement] and
Selbstwahrnehmung [autoperception– self-perception]. Part of the
reason for the lack of translator notes or a preface is that the text has
a detailed glossary, provided by von Weizsäcker with explanation
of key terms. The translation of this provides the German term,
before a French equivalent, and then von Weizsäcker’s gloss (GK
291–94/227–30). A separate set of notes on translation choices is
thus largely unnecessary. One choice is also notable for showing
that Foucault had, perhaps, not fully assimilated Heidegger’s work.
Abbau is rendered as disparition (which is also used to translate
Ausfall, failure), rather than the literal unbuilding or dismantling:
Abbau and Destruktion being the two terms Heidegger uses for the
challenge to the philosophical tradition. Derrida would of course
capture this in the term deconstruction, partly directed at what he
calls the ‘metaphysics of presence’.
Political Controversy
Reading the translation and Ey’s preface would give no indication
of how controversial a figure von Weizsäcker is. Indeed, it is unclear
how much of this Foucault would have been aware of in the 1950s. In
1933, shortly after the Nazi party had gained power, von Weizsäcker
gave a lecture at the University of Freiburg on the invitation of
Heidegger.147 This was shortly after Heidegger had been appointed as
Rector of the University, a political appointment which led to his join-
ing the Nazi party. While von Weizsäcker was not a Nazi member,
and Heidegger interrupted a pro-Nazi speech by a student before the
lecture, the content of the lecture can hardly be used to excuse either
man.148 It was published in 1934 in the Nazi journal Volk im Werden,
and in it, Von Weizsäcker advocated euthanasia and the political
control of medicine.149 This was because he argued that illness could
be a social problem, not caused by the social, but a problem for the
social and therefore of importance beyond the individually sick body.
Given that the nation was an organism, the pathogenic elements may
need to be removed.150
While von Weizsäcker himself was not tried for his actions during
the war, some of his medical research was complicit with the Nazi
regime.151 In the early years he was supportive of the shift from a
social insurance system to forced labour projects. Much more seri-
ously, Gernot Böhme suggests that writings such as this 1933 lecture
develop ‘a mode of thought that could be used to legitimate crimes
against humanity’. Böhme argues that ‘von Weizsäcker never actually
committed such crimes himself, though he shares some responsibility
for at least one’.152 This is by far the most damning charge. The
Institute he directed used the brains of children and young people
murdered at the Loben (now Lubliniec) hospital for research.153 The
hospital was notorious for evaluating paediatric patients, treating
some and poisoning others.
Some of his advocates ignore, or are ignorant of, these abhorrent
actions, which only became widely known since his death.154 One
biographical note simply says that ‘during the Second World War
he devoted all his energy to caring for injured soldiers at the military
hospital in Breslau’;155 another that ‘in 1941 he was appointed, as suc-
cessor of Otfrid Foerster, to the most prestigious chair in Neurology
in Germany at the University in Breslau. In 1945 the Heidelberg
Medical School established a chair in General Clinical Medicine espe-
cially for him’.156 This is the same formulation used in the prospectus
for his Gesammelte Schriften, published by Suhrkamp.157 The Viktor
von Weizsäcker Gesellschaft similarly glosses over this aspect, adding

only that in January 1945 he escaped Breslau. Though unstated, this
was part of a mass exodus as the Russians advanced and shortly
before the siege of the city.158 Often the only recognition of political
questions comes from his brother’s role as a Nazi diplomat.159 Ey’s
preface gives no indication at all.
Like the Binswanger translation, von Weizsäcker’s Le Cycle de la
structure does not appear to have sold well: few libraries have it and
second-hand copies are hard to find. It only received a single brief
review note at the time of the book’s publication.160 Apart from a
reference in the Binswanger manuscript, and a possible mention in
student notes, Foucault does not often refer to von Weizsäcker, and
there are only seven pages of notes on his work in the BNF archive.161
It may well have just been a commission for a recently graduated
student, trying to supplement his income. The request to take on
the project could have come direct from the press, with whom he
had worked on the Binswanger volume, or through an intermediary
such as Binswanger, Kuhn, Ey, Canguilhem, or Merleau-Ponty. But
Foucault did not do many translations, and was certainly interested
in the relation between philosophy and anthropology in this period.
This includes the course on philosophical anthropology from Lille and
the ENS through to the Kant translation and introduction as his sec-
ondary thesis. The translation of von Weizsäcker’s Der Gestaltkreis
is an important element in the story of the early Foucault, as it gives
a further sense of how his work was shaped by the practice of trans-
lation. But given what we know of von Weizsäcker’s actions, it is a
disturbing one too.
5
Nietzsche and Heidegger
A recently attributed short book notice on Gérard Deledalle’s history

of American philosophy can be added to the list of Foucault’s early
publications.1 It is quite disconnected from Foucault’s ostensible inter-
ests at this time, and is another indication that his reading was more
wide-ranging than is often acknowledged. Wahl wrote the book’s
preface, which perhaps explains how Foucault came to it. (Many
years later, Deledalle would invite Wahl and Foucault to teach at the
University of Tunis.2) Apparently, Foucault said the review was the
first thing he submitted for publication, although this cannot be true,
since Deledalle’s book was not published until the fourth quarter of
1954.3 The review was published anonymously, and omitted from
Dits et écrits. The full text of the note reads:
It is customary to present American philosophy as an additional chap-

ter to English philosophy, or to find the main chapters scattered in
books of psychology, logic or sociology. The novelty of M. Deladelle’s
book alone is enough to define its worth. But in this 220-page book,
there is much more than just a gathering of miscellaneous information
from scattered sources, for it is an original work of synthesis. After
an introduction in which the major historical influences on American
philosophy (theory of knowledge, Hegelianism, evolutionism) are out-
lined, the author defines the currents which are, in their motion, the
constants of this philosophy: pragmatism, neorealism, naturalism and
idealism. But analysis by schools should not make us forget the major
individual philosophers who have established themselves within or
beyond the schools. M. Deladelle devotes very dense pages to Pierce,
James, Royce, Dewey and Mead. This coherent and rich collection
110 Nietzsche and Heidegger
ends with a conclusion in which American philosophy is characterized

by its anti-Cartesianism. (CH 107)
This book notice, Maladie mentale et personnalité, the Binswanger

introduction, the von Weizsäcker translation and the two book chap-
ters published in 1957 are thus the only publications in the early
part of Foucault’s career. Although they appeared between 1954 and
1958, all were complete before he left France for Uppsala in August
1955.
As well as the two extensive manuscripts and course materials
discussed in Chapter 2, at least two draft articles were produced in
this early period. One is an eight-page typescript entitled ‘Remarques
sur l’enseignement de la Phénoménologie [remarks on the teaching
of phenomenology]’.4 In this typescript Foucault says that while
phenomenology is not part of the Inspector General’s programme,
it is a concern of students. He suggests that phenomenology can
be taught, but there are certainly challenges. A contrast is estab-
lished between the technical and largely untranslated work and the
semi-vulgarized version in the student’s mind of ‘descriptions, in lit-
erary technicolour, of “lived experiences”, meticulous [pointilleuses]
analyses of pseudo-emotions and quasi-sentiments’.5 This makes it
all the more important to teach phenomenology properly, especially
the work of Husserl. But Foucault adds that recent work makes
this easier– the ‘translations and remarkable analyses of Ricœur’
and Thao’s work on Phenomenology and Dialectical Materialism.
Foucault goes on to outline some of the misunderstandings he thinks
are common, and how they might be resolved. He insists that the
‘phenomenological description is not an florilegium, a herbarium
of lived experiences, dried between the pages of personal journals
or psychiatric protocols’, but rather, ‘like mathematics, a science of
foundations’.6 Phenomenology is both description and a ‘rigorous
science’– Husserl’s own description.7 While most of the text is a
programme in favour of this approach, there are some reflections on
its pedagogy, as its title indicates. It is possible this was the article
Foucault submitted to the journal L’Enseignement philosophique.
The editor, Jean Costilles, invited him to submit his reflections on the
agrégation in November 1951, but in February 1952 Foucault was
sent a letter rejecting his submission.8 The pedagogical concerns sug-
gest it is a piece for which the journal might have found a place, but
it is certainly not what Costilles requested. If indeed it is Foucault’s
submission for that purpose, then it is clear why it was not deemed
suitable.
There is also a 38-page untitled typescript on Merleau-Ponty,
Nietzsche and Heidegger 111
which Foucault seems to have intended for a journal: it is mentioned

in a letter to Jean-Paul Aron.9 Written shortly after Merleau-Ponty
had been elected to the Collège de France, and in part building on
his 1951–2 course on the ‘Human Sciences and Phenomenology’,
Foucault surveys much of Merleau-Ponty’s work to that date. It
relates his thought to Husserl, but also shows how it develops beyond
it and cannot be read as a simple continuation.10 It is very much
focused on Merleau-Ponty’s contributions to phenomenology, rather
than psychology, though it does note how his work was explicitly a
criticism of Gestalt theory but implicitly of phenomenology before
him.11 ‘Husserl refuses a quasi-psychology of the subject, Merleau-
Ponty refuses a psychology of the quasi-subject.’12 Heidegger and
Nietzsche are very briefly mentioned but more crucially Fink is seen
as a key commentator on Husserl.13 The theme of the world is present,
and it also touches on Merleau-Ponty’s relation to Marxism, which
comes through in a bit more detail at the end of the manuscript.14
But it is difficult to see what the key purpose of the piece is, and
this perhaps explains why it was left undeveloped and unpublished.
What is interesting is that these two unpublished texts were more
obviously philosophical, while the ones that he actually published
were more psychological. Another invitation to submit to Arcadie:
Revue Littéraire et scientifique in 1954 does not seem to have led to
anything.15
The publications from this time reflect many of the themes of
his teaching, as well as the reverse. It is clear that Foucault was
highly knowledgeable about contemporary and historical approaches
to psychology. The teaching appointments and writing commissions
indicate that this was recognized by others, even though he was only
in his late twenties when all this work was undertaken. The time
between these pieces and the publication of History of Madness in
1961 has been described by Macey as a ‘period of silence’, suggest-
ing his initial work was ‘not leading anywhere in particular’.16 Of
course, as Macey knows and recounts in detail, Foucault used this
time to produce the History of Madness, as well as to translate Kant’s
Anthropology and write its long introduction. Even though attaining
a doctorate was less a necessary rite of passage then than now, and
there are differences between education systems, Foucault was never-
theless doing high-level work at a young age. What is perhaps most
remarkable is how much he did before beginning his theses, rather
than his silence during their production.
It therefore would be unfair to characterize the early work nega-
tively. Miller suggests at this point Foucault ‘had yet to find his own
voice’,17 and Macey that the essays were ‘content-orientated’ and
lack his later ‘stylistic flamboyance’.18 In form that may well be true.
But as the analysis so far has suggested, there are multiple themes
which point towards later concerns. Foucault certainly wished to
erase traces of this work from his career trajectory, seeing History
of Madness as his first book, and trying to prevent republication
of Maladie mentale et personnalité (see Chapter 8). Yet the unpub-
lished texts, the lectures, and the publications give a different sense of
Foucault’s breadth and depth, of multiple possible projects, of paths
not taken, as well as many of the themes of Foucault’s later career.
Reading Foucault’s lectures and publications from the first half of the
1950s indicates that the key figures with whom he was in dialogue
were Hegel, Marx and Husserl. This philosophical lineage was set in
relation to a psychological one, where Freud and Binswanger were his
central references. But there is one striking omission from the figures
that he would later call his key inspirations: Nietzsche.19
Encountering Nietzsche in the 1950s

Foucault had first been introduced to Nietzsche at school,20 and he
was discussed in Wahl’s lectures alongside Heidegger and Husserl,
but this does not seem to have had a major impact. In various reports
Foucault suggests that it was Blanchot who led him to Bataille, and
Bataille who led him to Nietzsche (DE#330 IV, 437; EW II, 439), and
that reading Heidegger and Nietzsche together was ‘the philosophical
shock’ (DE#354 IV 703, FL 470). This combination of influences
helped Foucault to break with the Husserlian–Marxist state of the
French academy in 1945–55– a tendency he finds in Sartre and
Merleau-Ponty naturally, but also figures including Desanti and to
an extent Ricœur. Structuralism was one break with phenomenology,
while Nietzsche was another (DE#330 IV, 434; EW II, 436).
Blanchot might have been a direct route to Nietzsche. The 1943
collection Faux pas, which brings together a number of essays on
literature and language, has a few mentions of Nietzsche.21 There was
a more substantial engagement in the 1949 book La Part du feu, The
Work of Fire, in the chapter ‘On Nietzsche’s Side’.22 That chapter was
a discussion of Henri de Lubac, The Drama of Atheistic Humanism,23
but Blanchot also points to Jaspers: ‘Jaspers has shown, as no com-
mentator has before him, that all interpretation of Nietzsche is faulty
if it does not seek out the contradictions.’ 24
Bataille is the more obvious route though, with his book On
Nietzsche published in 1945.25 Foucault also read Bataille’s journal
Acéphale, which was almost entirely about Nietzsche in its short
life before the war, and had included an earlier text challenging his
appropriation by contemporary Nazism.26 Other contributors to the
journal included Wahl, Klossowski and Roger Caillois. Foucault later
recalled reading a critical review of Bataille: ‘What bowled me over
was reading an article that Sartre had written about Bataille before
the war, which I read after the war, which was such a monument of
incomprehension, of injustice and of arrogance, of spite and aggres-
sion, that I was from that moment implacably for Bataille against
Sartre.’27 Despite his dating, Foucault has in mind a piece Sartre pub-
lished in 1943, across three issues of Cahiers du Sud.28 As Bataille’s
translator and biographer Stuart Kendall notes, the ‘language in the
review was both acid and sparkling, humorously dismissive and
ironic, yet fuelled by fuming outrage’.29
Foucault’s friend Pinguet suggests a holiday in Italy in August–
September 1953 was crucial for the encounter with Nietzsche,
recalling Foucault reading the Untimely Meditations when they had
spare moments on the beach at Civitavecchia or at cafés.30 All of
Foucault’s biographers pick up on this indication as being a cru-
cial moment in Foucault’s intellectual development.31 Foucault later
recalled that 1953 was the crucial year (DE#330 IV, 436; EW II,
438), something Veyne also remembers Foucault saying.32 This would
fit with the themes of this period. Summer 1953 is shortly before the
completion of Maladie mentale et personnalité, but before the writing
of the Binswanger introduction. Macey suggests that the absence of
reference to Nietzsche from the book and the two chapters ‘suggests
that Pinguet’s memory is accurate on this point’.33 Yet the Binswanger
introduction dates from after the encounter, and still contains no
references. Indeed, while a compelling story, it is not clear that it is
entirely accurate.
Pinguet mentions that the text Foucault was reading in Italy was a
bilingual edition, which should help to narrow things down, but actu-
ally begins to complicate the account. The four texts that comprise
the Unzeitgemäße Betrachtungen were published between 1873 and
1876.34 The first translation into French was by Henri Albert, who
translated all four in two volumes entitled Considérations inactuelles,
which appeared in 1907 and 1922.35 These were part of the Œuvres
complètes de Frédéric Nietzsche, a series under Albert’s overall direc-
tion. The texts were subsequently retranslated by Geneviève Bianquis
and appeared as Considérations intempestives III et IV in 1954 and
Considérations inactuelles I et II in 1964.36 Both of these volumes are
bilingual, in the series ‘Collection bilingue des classiques allemands’.
There are multiple re-editions, but 1954 and 1964 are the earliest,
with each text even specifying that they were printed in November.
If Pinguet’s recollection of a bilingual edition is correct, then Foucault

must have read it after November 1954. Foucault’s appointment diary
for 1953 lists the places visited in Italy, including Civitavecchia on 1
September.37 Given the date of the trip, Foucault could have read this
work in German or the Albert translation, either or both of which are
possible. There is a sequence of notes from the second meditation in
Foucault’s archive.38 Helpfully, many of these specify both the essay
paragraph and a page number. There are twenty-one such references,
eighteen of which accord to Albert’s translation. Given that Foucault
does not date his notes, it is possible some of the references are from
different times, and/or to different editions. But it seems clear that his
most sustained reading of this text was in Albert’s version. Yet it is
notable that in future years Foucault refers to these texts simply as
the Intempestives– the 1954 Bianquis choice, not her 1964 one or
the Albert title.39
Looking back on this period many decades later, Foucault recalls:
Nietzsche was a revelation to me. I felt that there was someone quite
different from what I had been taught. I read him with great passion
and broke with my life, left my job in the asylum, left France: I felt I
had been trapped. Through Nietzsche, I had become a stranger to all
that. (TS 13; DE#362 IV, 780)
While undoubtedly a key moment, Foucault’s departure for Uppsala

came almost two years after the summer of 1953. In the interim, as
Chapter 2 showed, Nietzsche also featured in his teaching with the
most explicit discussion in the concluding part of his course on phil
osophical anthropology, likely dating from Paris in 1954–5.
Most of Nietzsche’s work had been translated in the early twentieth
century, although, like those into English around the same time, they
left a lot to be desired and more reliable translations appeared slowly.
More significant for Foucault’s reading, at least initially, was the sec-
ondary literature. Bataille’s book on Nietzsche had been published in
1945, and Jaspers’ study was translated into French in 1950.40 That
same year saw the publication of Kaufmann’s English-language study,
which Foucault also read (see Chapter 2). There had been earlier
studies of Nietzsche in French too, including Lefebvre’s anti-fascist
study in 1939.41
Jaspers’ study was particularly important, something that Pinguet
also notes.42 This book was introduced by Wahl and Foucault used
it extensively. Wahl had first reviewed Jaspers’ study in Acéphale in
1937.43 Jaspers used the edition of Nietzsche’s works published by
his sister, Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche, the Großoktavausgabe, which
was initially in sixteen volumes, and expanded to nineteen volumes

for the second edition.44 This was the edition that Foucault used in all
his early writing and teaching on Nietzsche, and he follows Jaspers’
referencing style to volume by Roman numeral and page number. It
has today been superseded by the Colli-Montinari edition.45 Many of
Foucault’s notes on Nietzsche that quote his work are actually refer-
enced to Jaspers, and he often specifies this with a reference to Jaspers’
page number alongside the coded reference to Nietzsche. Indeed, as
Aner Barzilay has shown, the archived materials on Nietzsche from
the mid 1950s are almost wholly reliant on Jaspers’ text.46 Foucault
had also read the long May 1938 lecture by Jaspers on ‘Nietzsche and
Christianity’, which had been published in 1946 and was translated
into French in 1949.47
Yet, despite Wahl’s teaching and his advocacy of Jaspers’ book,
Nietzsche was still not an established part of the French philosophical
curriculum. As Schrift has discussed, Nietzsche appeared first in the
agrégation programme in 1929 with On the Genealogy of Morality,
but then did not appear again until 1958 and 1959 with that same
text, this time in a French translation.48 Assigning the text in French,
rather than German, meant that all students would have had to be
familiar with it, not just those who chose German as their second for-
eign language. Schrift suggests that the growth of French interest in
Nietzsche can be traced to that 1950s appearance on the curriculum,
and that Deleuze’s teaching at the Sorbonne included a 1958 course on
Nietzsche, which led to the 1962 book Nietzsche et la philosophie.49
That was followed by the Royaumont conference on Nietzsche from
4–8 July 1964, at which Foucault gave a presentation on ‘Nietzsche,
Freud, Marx’. The proceedings were published in 1967.50
Pinguet also recalls a conversation in the 1950s between Foucault
and Hyppolite. Where should you begin with Nietzsche, asked
Hyppolite? With On the Genealogy of Morality? No, said Foucault,
‘begin with the most passionate [ardent], the most biting [mordant],
with Zarathustra’.51 Pinguet says that he then told Foucault: ‘since
you admire Nietzsche so much, you should write a book on him’.
Foucault replied with the comment that ‘but it is precisely because
I admire him so much that I would never dream of that: one would
have to be so strong, so great to be measured against his thought’.52
Yet this is not quite the case. ‘Nietzsche, Freud, Marx’ is one excep-
tion, but the most famous piece Foucault wrote is 1971’s ‘Nietzsche,
Genealogy, History’, published in a volume in tribute to Hyppolite
(DE#84 II, 136–56; EW II, 369–91). That Foucault chose to publish
his most important essay on Nietzsche for a volume in tribute to
Hyppolite, on the issue of genealogy, is only partly in tension with his
claims of a reluctance to write and a suggestion to focus the reading

elsewhere.
These were the only essays on Nietzsche that Foucault published.
He allowed a 1973 lecture on Nietzsche given in Brazil to be published
there, but it appeared in French translation and English only after his
death (DE#139 II, 538–53; EW III, 1–16). For many years these were
the key pieces to read to understand Foucault’s interest. Foucault also
gave a course at the University of Vincennes in the winter of 1969–70,
which is preserved in the archive under the title ‘Commencement,
Origine, Histoire [Beginning, Origin, History]’.53 Foucault lectured
on Nietzsche in his first Collège de France course Lectures on the Will
to Know, though much of the manuscript is missing, and an impor-
tant lecture from McGill in 1971 was published in its place. There
is much to discuss in these pieces, and The Archaeology of Foucault
will analyse them in detail. The later material is already treated in
Foucault: The Birth of Power.54
These published traces suggest that Foucault’s written engagement
began in the 1960s. Yet the archives tell a slightly different story of
the initial encounter. They confirm what Defert has long claimed, that
Foucault began writing on Nietzsche much earlier, almost as soon as
he started reading him (C 20/21). Some undated manuscripts almost
certainly come from the mid 1950s, since some are on the back of
the typescript of Maladie mentale et personnalité. Foucault claims
that ‘there are three related experiences: the dream, drunkenness, and
unreason [le rêve, l’ivresse et la déraison]’.55 The dream, of course,
was a focus of the Binswanger introduction, and drink was a personal
struggle for Foucault at this time (C 19/19, 20/21), although his
ivresse is probably a translation of Nietzsche’s Rausch, and so has a
wider meaning of intoxication. But the question of unreason points
the way to future concerns, while the three-part analysis perhaps
suggests why Binswanger alone was insufficient.
The other materials comprise a host of sketches, false starts and
fairly well-worked-out essays. There are also manuscripts on phi-
losophy as exegesis of texts,56 and one on ‘Homer and Classical
Philology’, which contains a description of the process of exploring
the ‘archaic and fundamental lines’ of a text’s ‘geology’.57 There is
also an intriguing outline of what appears to be a book plan.58 This
has sections on ‘Memory and Forgetting’, subdivided into ‘History
and Logos’, ‘Culture’ and ‘Continuation and End of Philosophy’;
‘Idols after the Twilight’, with three parts of ‘Nature’, ‘Truth’ and
‘Man’; and a final section on ‘The Second Morning’, divided into ‘The
Song of the World’, ‘Tragic Space’ and ‘Poetry and Philosophy’.
In one of his notes from this period, Foucault refers to Nietzsche’s
The Gay Science §7: ‘So far, all that gives colour to existence still lacks
a history. Where could you find a history of love, of avarice, of envy,
of conscience, of piety, or of cruelty? Even a comparative history of
law or at least of punishment is so far lacking completely . . .’59 Even
before knowing that Foucault made notes on this text, Macey had
already suggested it as an inspiration.60 Indeed, many of Foucault’s
subsequent projects address these very questions, especially around
cruelty, punishment and sexuality. In his 1971 ‘Nietzsche, Genealogy,
History’ essay, and just before citing a different part of §7, Foucault
had noted that genealogy must seek out its questions ‘in the most
unpromising places, in what we tend to feel is without history– in
sentiments, love, conscience, instincts’ (DE#84 II, 136; EW II, 369).
Yet the notes and manuscripts also validate Foucault’s claim that
his initial engagement with Nietzsche was ‘from the perspective of
enquiry into the history of knowledge– the history of reason: how
does one elaborate a history of rationality?’ (DE#330 IV, 436; EW
II, 438). Foucault is particularly interested in Beyond Good and Evil
§39, where Nietzsche says:
Indeed, it could be part of the fundamental character of existence

[Grundbeschaffenheit des Daseins] that someone would perish from
complete knowledge [völligen Erkenntniss] of it– such that the strength
of a spirit would be measured by just how much he could still endure
of the ‘truth’, or, more precisely, to what extent he would need it to be
diluted, shrouded, sweetened, blunted, falsified.61
In one of these early unpublished manuscripts, Foucault translates the

key phrase as ‘Périr par la connaissance absolue pourrait faire partie
du fondement de l’être’– ‘to perish through absolute knowledge may
well as form a part of the basis of being’.62 Foucault also references
Daybreak §501 with its call for self-experimentation.63 Both these
texts are discussed in ‘Nietzsche, Genealogy, History’ (DE# II, 155–6;
EW II, 388), the Vincennes course and the McGill lecture. But these
early materials also help substantiate Foucault’s 1978 claim about
why Nietzsche was important for him.
It’s not enough to do a history of rationality; one needs to do the

history of truth itself. That is, instead of asking a science to what
extent its history has brought it closer to the truth (or prevented it from
approaching the latter), wouldn’t it be necessary, rather, to tell oneself
that the truth consists in a certain relationship with that discourse that
knowledge maintains with itself, and ask whether that relationship
itself might not be, or have, a history?
What I found striking is that for Nietzsche a rationality– that of a
science, a practice, a discourse– is not measured by the truth that sci-
ence, that discourse, that practice may produce. Truth itself forms part
of the history of discourse and is like an effect internal to a discourse or
a practice. (DE#281 IV, 54; EW III, 253)64
Through Heidegger
The archival material shows how deep the engagement with Nietzsche
was at this early time, even if, as Foucault himself says, he published
little, and even that was from a decade or more later. This, Foucault
claimed late in life, is because he felt it ‘important to have a small
number of authors with whom one thinks, with whom one works,
but on whom one does not write’ (DE#354 IV, 703; PPC 250).
The other writer Foucault says he has read but not written about is
Heidegger. Indeed, Foucault is explicit that it was reading these two
thinkers together was crucial for his development.
Heidegger has always been for me the essential philosopher. I started

by reading Hegel, then Marx, and I set out to read Heidegger in 1951
or 1952; then in 1952 or 1953, I no longer remember, I read Nietzsche.
I still have the notes that I took on Heidegger when I read him– I
have tons of them!– a nd they are far more important than those I
took on Hegel or Marx. My whole philosophical development was
determined by my reading of Heidegger. I nevertheless recognize that
Nietzsche outweighed him. I don’t know Heidegger well enough, not
much of Being and Time, nor the more recent works. My knowledge
of Nietzsche is much greater than that of Heidegger. Nevertheless these
were my two fundamental experiences. It is probable that if I had not
read Heidegger, I would not have read Nietzsche. I had tried to read
Nietzsche in the fifties but Nietzsche alone said nothing to me. Whereas
Nietzsche and Heidegger: that was the philosophical shock! (DE#354
IV, 703; PPC 250; see TS 12–13; DE#362 IV, 780)65
Foucault’s knowledge of Heidegger has already been discussed in part

because it helped him so much in his work on Binswanger. Despite
the claim that he did not know Heidegger that well,66 it is clear
from the notes he mentions, which are now available in the archive,
that the engagement really was significant. But while he did write a
little on Nietzsche, he rarely mentioned Heidegger explicitly. Many
of Foucault’s teachers spoke about Nietzsche and Heidegger, notably
Wahl, and there are some notes from Foucault, which unusually for
him are dated, from June to August 1947, on history, comedy and
tragedy in which both their names appear.67 However, his recollection
that the serious engagement began in the 1950s does seem plausible.
Macey has suggested that reading Heidegger in this period ‘was not
the easiest of tasks’ and, despite Sartre, ‘even basic Heideggerian
terminology was unfamiliar’. Macey goes on to provide a list of some
texts by Heidegger available in French, though it is incomplete and
there are some errors with dates.68
Heidegger’s most important work, Sein und Zeit, was published
in 1927, but it took a long time before it was translated into other
European languages. The English Being and Time only appeared
in 1962, and the French was even slower: the first division was not
translated until 1964, and the second not until 1986.69 However,
archival work by Sylvain Camilleri and Daniel Proulx has shown
that Corbin worked on an almost complete translation much earlier,
c.1943–4.70 Camilleri and Proulx append a glossary to their discus-
sion, which shows that Corbin dropped réalité-humain and translated
Dasein as ‘Présence-humaine, Présence tout court, (l’)être-présence,
l’être-Présence’.71
While this translation was not published, some major essays were.
As noted in Chapter 4, ‘What is Metaphysics?’ had been translated
in part in 1931, and in a revised and complete translation in the
Qu’est-ce que la métaphysique? collection compiled by Corbin in
1938, alongside parts of Being and Time and Kant and the Problem
of Metaphysics (1929), and the complete essays ‘The Essence of
Ground’ (1929) and ‘Hölderlin and the Essence of Poetry’ (1936).72
Some of these texts were later reprinted in Questions, the first volume
of what would become a four-volume French edition of Heidegger’s
shorter works. The long 1930 essay ‘On the Essence of Truth’ also
appeared as a short book in French in 1948.73 Walter Biemel and
de Waelhens then translated the Kant book in its entirety in 1953,
with a forty-page introduction.74 The ‘Letter on Humanism’ had first
appeared in part in French in 1947, along with a long introduction by
its recipient, Beaufret.75 It appeared in full in German in 1947, along
with the essay ‘Plato’s Doctrine of Truth’, and then in a bilingual
German–French edition in 1957.76 Most of these pieces first appeared
separately in German and were later collected in Wegmarken.77
Aside from the major absence of Being and Time, French audiences
in 1950 had a reasonably good sample of Heidegger’s work, and
certainly much more than was available in English.78 Foucault’s refer-
ences to Heidegger in early manuscripts indicate a decent knowledge
of these writings. Much of Heidegger’s work was unavailable, but
this was in large part because it was not yet published in German.
Things changed from 1950. The important collections Holzwege
and Vorträge und Aufsätze from 1950 and 1954 brought together
a range of significant essays on art, science and technology, Hegel,

Nietzsche, poetry and Greek thought. These were translated into
French in 1958 and 1962.79 Heidegger’s major two-volume study
of Nietzsche appeared in German in 1961, but not in French until
1971.80 Heidegger’s lecture courses also began to appear in the 1950s,
from Introduction to Metaphysics (1935–6) in 1953 and What is
Called Thinking (1951–2) in 1954, though not in French until 1967
and 1973. The comprehensive publication of the Gesamtausgabe
began only in 1975. With the significant exception of the ‘Letter on
Humanism’, this means that the later Heidegger, by which is usually
meant the material from the mid 1930s onwards, only started to
appear even in German in the 1950s, and initially French scholars had
to work with it in this language.
Now that the archive is open, it is possible to be more specific about
how Foucault read Heidegger, though with the qualification that
some notes may not be preserved, and that if Foucault annotated his
own copies of books, these are not available. There are quite detailed
notes on the Corbin volume, which appear to be the earliest ones
preserved. This is the extent of Foucault’s explicit engagement with
Being and Time, and there are limited notes on the early Heidegger.
Much more extensive are notes on the ‘Letter on Humanism’,
Holzwege and Vorträge und Aufsätze. With the two collections there
are detailed notes on nearly all of the essays. Some of these notes
are very e xtensive– 3
2 pages on ‘Anaximander’s Speech’, and many
pages on the essays on Nietzsche, for example. (This counts only the
consolidated notes on an essay, not other pages with quotations from,
or reference to, those texts.) There are also a lot of notes on Was heißt
Denken? both the May 1952 lecture published in the Merkur journal,
and the full course published in 1954, which includes discussion of
Nietzsche. The emphasis of these notes help explain Foucault’s 1982
claim that ‘Being and Time is difficult, but the more recent works are
clearer’ (TS 12–13; DE#362 IV, 780).
While all Foucault’s notes are in a folder labelled ‘Heidegger sur
Nietzsche’, they extend far beyond that specific focus.81 Most of
Foucault’s notes are to the published books and, given the 1954 pub-
lication of Vorträge und Aufsätze and Was heißt Denken? this helps
to date the majority of them. However, the folders also include notes
on unpublished texts, including fourteen pages on the 1929/30 course
The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics, which was not published
even in German until 1983,82 and on Einleitung in die Philosophie, a
course delivered in 1927, and not published until 1996. Wahl seems
the likely source for both courses, with the latter being the focus of
one of his own courses, and the former being mentioned in some of
his teaching (see Chapter 1). Indeed, Foucault’s notes on these courses
are filed with ones on Wahl’s reading of Heidegger.83
The French secondary literature was patchy. The work of Sartre,
Merleau-Ponty and Lévinas all shaped the way Heidegger was read,
though little of Lévinas’s work was published at that time, and Sartre
and Merleau-Ponty were developing related ideas rather than explic-
itly writing on him. A key interpreter was Koyré, who reviewed
Heidegger’s ‘What is Metaphysics?’ in La Nouvelle Revue française,
and wrote an introduction to its partial translation for Bifur in 1931.84
Koyré’s biographer Paola Zambelli suggests that the translation was
offered to La Nouvelle Revue française first, but they refused it, with
this review piece in its place.85 Koyré also wrote essays for the first two
issues of Bataille’s journal Critique in 1946, mainly on ‘The Essence
of Truth’, along with a shorter piece for Fontaine that same year.86
As Zambelli reports, ‘the first knowledge of Heidegger in France was
certainly due in large part to Koyré, but the mistrust or hostility. . . is
also owed to him’.87 Indeed, according to Lévinas, Koyré was the first
person to report back on Heidegger’s political allegiance to National
Socialism around 1933, following another visit to Germany.88 There
was also a debate in Les Temps modernes about Heidegger’s politics,
which took place in 1946 and 1947. Although much new information
has come to light since, it is simply untrue that the ‘Heidegger Affair’
only began in the 1980s.
The most comprehensive text in French was de Waelhens’s impor-
tant introductory study from 1942. De Waelhens says that he had
access to notes from some of Heidegger’s students, and that in ‘better
times’ had ‘several conversations with Eugen Fink’.89 Vuillemin sum-
marized some of the German debates in 1951, and had published a
book in 1954 on the post-Kantian tradition of German thought, with
the third part on Heidegger.90 Foucault was also reading the litera-
ture in German: Löwith’s Heidegger: Denker in Dürftiger Zeit seems
to have been especially important, particularly for Foucault’s initial
reading of Heidegger, as it responds to the lectures on Nietzsche.91
In terms of Heidegger’s reception in France after the Second World
War, Beaufret was a crucial figure.92 This was in his writing, teach-
ing and through the ‘Letter on Humanism’ and its introduction, as
discussed in Chapter 1, but also through his role in organizing a
conference with Heidegger at Cerisy-la-Salle in Normandy in August
1955.93 This was Heidegger’s first visit to France, which seems
strange, given that he was born in Meßkirch and spent the bulk of
his career in the city of Freiburg. As Dennis Schmidt remarks, ‘Given
that one can easily ride a bicycle from Freiburg to France, this is quite
astonishing.’94 Today that is indeed true– F reiburg is only about
fifteen miles from the border. Yet Heidegger was born in 1889 and
at that time France was much further away, as the Alsace-Lorraine
region had been part of the German empire since 1871. After the
Treaty of Versailles in 1919 it returned to France, but was obviously
a highly disputed area. It was invaded by Hitler in 1940, and liberated
in 1944.
The event at Cerisy-la-Salle had been co-organized by Beaufret
with Maurice de Gandillac, professor of philosophy at the Sorbonne.
Axelos was commissioned to translate Heidegger’s opening lecture,
‘What is Philosophy?’, along with Beaufret. Heidegger read the lec-
ture on the first day, 28 August, followed by Beaufret reading the
translation, and on subsequent days they had discussions of texts by
Kant, Hegel and Hölderlin, and questions and debate.95 Heidegger
refused to speak French, even though he had at least a passive under-
standing of the language, and so all the discussions were mediated
through Beaufret and, especially, Axelos, who served as interpreter.96
Important French thinkers such as Deleuze, Ricœur, Lucien Goldmann
and Gabriel Marcel attended, but Sartre, Lévinas, Merleau-Ponty and
Wahl all refused invitations. Wahl’s refusal is probably indicative of
the reasons for the others. He did not go to Cerisy because Heidegger
was a Nazi, but he still taught his work because he was a great
philosopher.97
Hyppolite had apparently also wanted to invite Heidegger to the
ENS, but feared protests from leftist students.98 It was during this
trip to France that Heidegger and his wife also spent some time
with Lacan, Georges Braque and René Char, all mediated through
Axelos’s interpretation.99 The encounter with Lacan, in particular,
was a failure– Axelos recalls that Heidegger had no interest in Lacan’s
work, while Lacan’s knowledge of Heidegger was ‘very, very incom-
plete [lacunairement]’.100 A recording was made of the Cerisy-la-Salle
event, and Derrida recalls listening to it in Paris during his student
days.101 Foucault had left for Sweden before the event took place,
and there is no record of his having listened to the discussions.102
Heidegger’s lecture was first published in French in 1957.103 Yet,
even after he was based in Uppsala, Foucault’s engagement contin-
ued. Pinguet recalls attending a lecture in Paris by Beda Allemann
on Heidegger and Hölderlin with Foucault in 1956 or 1957, which
Wahl also attended.104 However Pinguet stresses that Foucault ‘defied
intellectual fashions and no more joined the Heideggerian church
[chapelle] than that of the Lacanians’.105
Yet Heidegger was important to Foucault, in part because he
offered a way of reading other thinkers. As Defert, Ewald and Gros
suggest, Foucault was reading Kant through Nietzsche from 1952
and, ‘from 1953, Kant and Nietzsche through Heidegger’.106 But the
trajectory from the course on philosophical anthropology through to
the translation of Kant’s Anthropology suggests that he was reading
first Kant, and then a little later Nietzsche, and ultimately both of
them through and against Heidegger. What Foucault, following Kant,
identifies as the question of anthropology is at root the question ‘what
is man?’ That was the topic of the famous dispute in Davos between
Heidegger and Cassirer, which focused in large part on their different
readings of Kant.107 Heidegger apparently turned his lectures into his
book on Kant in an intense three-week burst immediately after the
Davos meeting.108 The question becomes, for Heidegger, the problem
of humanism; for Foucault the invention of ‘man’ in The Order of
Things. This is a theme that will be picked up in the discussion of
Foucault’s Kant thesis in Chapter 7. For the later Foucault it becomes
a concern with subjectivity.
Jean Barraqué
Nietzsche was an important part of the intellectual side of the rela-
tionship Foucault had with the modernist composer Jean Barraqué.109
While Foucault is more commonly associated with literature and the
visual arts, he also had links to the world of modernist music, dating
back to his student days. He had met Pierre Boulez in 1951 but did
not stay in touch with him and they only had contact again in the
1970s. Foucault was close to Gilbert Humbert, a student of Olivier
Messiaen (C 16/16), knew the film composer Louis Saguer,110 and
Michel Fano, a friend of Boulez, who wrote a piece for the first issue
of Boulez’s journal Domaine musical, and scored several of Robbe-
Grillet’s films.111 But the most significant contact was with Barraqué,
who had also been a student of Messiaen at the Conservatoire,
and later was mentored by him at the CNRS.112 Defert recalls that
Foucault had attended some of Messiaen’s classes with Barraqué
(FMT 219/217). Barraqué admired Schubert and Webern, but his
most significant influences were Debussy and Beethoven.113 He wrote
extensive studies of both: a book on Debussy, and unpublished work
on Beethoven, notably a study of the Fifth Symphony.114 In time he
would come to appreciate Wagner.115
Foucault and Barraqué met in 1952, but the relationship ended
badly in the winter of 1955–6, shortly after Foucault’s move to
Uppsala. Defert reports that when Barraqué died in 1973, at the age
of just forty-five, Foucault had only seen him once since the 1950s
(C 44/54).116 The personal side of their relationship has been explored
by their biographers, most fully by Paul Griffiths and Eribon. Griffiths

and Eribon used the correspondence held by the Association Jean
Barraqué, which has a terrible beauty.117
Foucault rarely spoke of Barraqué in print, but did acknowledge
his importance in a 1967 interview, suggesting that the serial and
twelve-tone work Barraqué and Boulez composed represented a rup-
ture in the dialectical universe; and was as important as reading
Nietzsche for his early intellectual formation. Foucault wonders if
his interviewer had ever heard Barraqué’s music, whom he describes
as ‘one of most brilliant and least known musicians of the current
generation’ (DE#50 I, 613). Foucault adds, though, that he is now
‘more interested in painting than music’ (DE#50 I, 613; see DE#234
III, 591), a claim which makes sense, given the work he was then
doing on Manet, following a course in Tunisia on Western art and
the powerful reading of Velázquez’s Las Meninas in The Order of
Things. In a later discussion Foucault talks of the impact of the
musical revolution he experienced at close hand in the 1950s, but at
that time he singled out Boulez as the key figure (DE#305 IV, 219–22;
EW II 241–4).118 Griffiths suggests this is ‘understandable: by 1982,
when this interview was recorded, the two of them were professors at
the Collège de France, seigneurs of French culture’.119 They had also
taken part in an IRCAM discussion at the Centre Pompidou in 1978,
along with Deleuze, Roland Barthes and some composers.120 But in
the 1950s, Griffiths underscores that the real encounter was with
Barraqué: ‘Foucault had no contact with Boulez between 1951 and
the mid seventies, as Boulez has confirmed.’121
Equally, Griffiths and Laurent Feneyrou, Barraqué’s literary editor,
indicate that Foucault’s influence can be found in Barraqué’s work.
Foucault importantly suggested things for Barraqué to read, includ-
ing texts by Heidegger, Nietzsche and Binswanger. Barraqué used
some of Nietzsche’s poems in his Séquence cantata, which Foucault
says was a text he gave to him (DE#50 I, 613).122 Most significantly
Foucault introduced Barraqué to Hermann Broch’s 1945 novel, The
Death of Virgil.123 Foucault may have learned of it from a review in
Critique in 1954.124 A French translation by Albert Kohn, La Mort
de Virgile, appeared in February 1955, and this was the version
Barraqué read.125 Broch’s novel is in four parts– Water: The Arrival,
Fire: The Descent, Earth: The Expectation, Air: The Homecoming.
Barraqué planned his song cycle based on this work in five parts, with
the final a recapitulation of themes from the others.126 Barraqué wrote
an outline of the second part on 24 March 1956, which alone was to
be in thirteen pieces.127 In total he imagined it would be ‘much longer
than the Saint Matthew Passion and Parsifal combined’.128
Barraqué indicated in 1972 that all his future writing would be

devoted to this work, which fittingly for its theme would be finished
only with his death.129 Barraqué had previously said that ‘Music is
drama, it is pathos, it is death. It is a complete gamble, trembling on
the edge of suicide. If music is not that, if it is not the overcoming
of limits, it is nothing.’130 But his premature demise the following
year meant all that is left are fragments.131 One piece Barraqué did
complete was ‘. . . au délà du Hasard’, which had its premiere at
the Théâtre de l’Odéon in Paris on 26 January 1960, conducted by
Boulez.132
The readings Foucault provided inspired Barraqué’s musical com-
positions, but it has been claimed that the influence went further. One
essay from 1954, ‘Des goûts et des couleurs. . . et où l’on en discute
[Tastes and colours. . . and where we dispute them]’, was published in
the first issue of Domaine musical, a journal linked to Pierre Boulez’s
series of concerts in Paris, under the same name.133 Griffiths suggests
that this, among others, was a text ‘in which Foucault may have had
a hand’.134 The title of the essay is a quotation from Nietzsche’s Thus
Spoke Zarathustra, in which Zarathustra upbraids his friends for
thinking there is no dispute over taste: ‘All life is a struggle over taste
and tasting’ [Geschmack und Schmecken]’. In the French version
Barraqué consulted, this sentence is indeed rendered as ‘Mais tout
vie est lutte autour des goûts et des couleurs.’ Taste, Nietzsche’s
Zarathustra suggests, is like ‘weight, scales and weighers at the same
time [Gewicht zugleich und Wagschale und Wägender]’, or, in the
French, ‘à la fois le poids, la balance et le peseur’.135 Barraqué uses
this as a beginning for a discussion of ‘taste and colour’ as questions
of judgement, drawing on Voltaire and debates about aesthetics and
morality as much as musical themes and creativity. It shifts at the end
to a discussion of the importance of serialism. It is not clear on what
basis Griffiths assumes Foucault’s hand in this piece, though it would
seem highly likely that Foucault and Barraqué would have discussed
its themes, especially in its opening part. Equally the exchange in
written work was not one way. Foucault dedicated the copy of the
translation of Binswanger’s Dream and Existence he gave Barraqué
in effusive terms: ‘This book, my dear Jean, I am not giving you:
it is returning to you, by force of fraternal rights that make it a
common belonging, and a sign that cannot be wiped out.’136 This crit-
ical engagement with Nietzsche and Heidegger, and the break from
Barraqué, overlapped with Foucault’s move to Uppsala.
6
Madness– U
ppsala to Warsaw
Between August 1955 and October 1958, Foucault lived and worked
in Uppsala, Sweden. He had two roles. One was heading the cultural
activities of the Alliance française, housed in the Maison de France on
the fifth floor of a building at 22 St Johannesgaten (now renumbered
to 5). He was also a university lecturer in the French language in the
Department of Romance Languages at Uppsala University.1 Foucault
got the position in Uppsala on the recommendation of Georges
Dumézil, who was asked to suggest someone for a post he had held
himself from 1931–3. Dumézil recalls that he did not know anyone
from that generation, and so he asked Raoul Curiel, an archaeologist,
for a suggestion. Curiel suggested Foucault, as ‘the most intelligent
person that he had ever known’.2 Dumézil wrote to Foucault on 15
October 1954 explaining the role:
The position is one of the top-jobs [in English in the original] in

cultural relations, with good future prospects. It has been held by
linguists, historians, philosophers, future writers. . . You will have a
nice apartment in the Maison de France. . . I won’t speak about the
library, the Carolina Rediviva, one of the best in Europe, nor about
the countryside, (the forest two hundred meters from the town), nor of
the wonderful Swedish youth.3
Foucault sent a copy of his CV to Dumézil on 29 October 1954, a

document which is curious for two reasons. One is that it reports on
all his publications to date, including the forthcoming translation of
von Weizsäcker and the chapter for the updated edition of Weber,
Madness– Uppsala to Warsaw 127
but not the text for Des chercheurs français, nor the text Psychiatrie
et analyse existentielle, which he had claimed the previous year to be
his secondary thesis (see Chapter 2). Instead, and this is the second
reason, it lists two different theses:
Principal thesis: Study on the notion of ‘World’ in phenomenology and

its importance for the human sciences
Complementary thesis: Study on the psycho-physics of the sign [signal]

and the statistical interpretation of perception4
Foucault would have been well placed to write both of these theses,
given his work in Lille and Paris. Sabot has plausibly suggested that the
manuscript ‘Phénoménologie et psychologie’, discussed in Chapter 2,
is a draft of the first.5 The second seems more related to the research
work he was doing with Georges and Jacqueline Verdeaux. But he
would complete neither project. This does not seem to be a foregone
conclusion, as he had checked with Dumézil before accepting this
post that the work there would not prevent him completing a thesis
which was ‘now quite advanced’.6 A letter from Uppsala to Barraqué
also indicates a plan to finish it and return to France.7 But instead his
teaching and research developed in wholly new directions.
With Foucault’s CV in hand, Dumézil made the introduction to
Uppsala, and Foucault took up the post on 1 July 1955. It was
a two-year position, which could be renewed two or exceptionally
three times.8 Foucault’s post was renewed in spring 1957. Although
correspondence suggests they met in Paris, Dumézil later recalled that
their first encounter was when he finished teaching at the Collège de
France in 1956 and visited Uppsala.9 There was a ritual parade of
their formal qualifications and, establishing beyond doubt that he
was the senior, Dumézil proposed that they use the familiar ‘tu’.10
Dumézil was 28 years older than Foucault, and this was the beginning
of a long friendship, only brought to an end with Foucault’s death.
Foucault often addressed him as ‘dear father’ in his letters.11 Dumézil
says that he read Foucault’s books, and that they did talk about each
other’s work in their regular meetings but, despite Eribon’s urging,
adds little about the nature of their discussions.12 Dumézil did reveal
that he played a role in Foucault’s election to the Collège de France
some years later, noting that he petitioned colleagues with the admo-
nition: ‘Careful, don’t let genius slip away.’13
Foucault was described by one of his Uppsala colleagues, the
docent Göran Hammarström, as ‘a typical French intellectual’.14 He
taught a range of courses in Uppsala, though these were restricted to
128 Madness– Uppsala to Warsaw
French literature because of his very limited knowledge of Swedish.

Foucault co-marked some translations from Swedish into French,
but Hammarström implies that this was only on the basis of the final
French style, not its accuracy. ‘He was certainly eager to give fair
marks. He took the task seriously even if it could not have interested
him very much.’15 The university records provide quite a bit more
information.16 Foucault appears in all these records as ‘Foucault, Paul
Michel’, and his background is given as ‘Agrégé of the University
of Paris and former student of the École Normale Supérieure’. The
university had two semesters: höstterminen– a utumn semester, run-
ning from September to January, and vårterminen– spring semester,
running from late January or early February to early June.
For autumn 1955, the records say that he will provide details of his
teaching at a later point, but for the remainder of the time there are
quite precise records.17 In spring 1956 his public lecture course was
on ‘Contemporary French Theatre’, and he ran seminars on literature
and seventeenth-century theatre.18 In autumn 1956, he gave a course
on ‘Love in French Literature from the Marquis de Sade to Jean
Genet’, and seminars on French literature from 1850–1900, Molière’s
Tartuffe, and contemporary literature.19 In spring 1957, he repeated
the course on ‘Love in French Literature’, and his seminars were on
French literature of the seventeenth century, contemporary literature,
and the close reading was of Racine’s Andromaque.20
In autumn 1957 Foucault changed his public lecture course to look
at ‘Religious Experience in French Literature from Chateaubriand to
Bernanos’,21 repeated the seminars on Andromaque and contemporary
literature, and another seminar on French literature of the nineteenth
century.22 While de Sade and Genet are well known, François-René de
Chateaubriand (1768–1848) and Georges Bernanos (1888–1948) are
perhaps less familiar to Anglophone readers. According to the records,
he repeated the course on religious experience in spring 1958, as well
as the seminars on nineteenth-century literature and contemporary
literature, with his chosen text being Molière’s Don Juan. That term
he also led an evening course on French civilization at the Maison
de France.23 In autumn 1958 the topic of his public course was not
announced, and the rest was scheduled to be the same as the previous
term, but Foucault left before teaching began.24
Various reports indicate that Foucault was a popular lecturer.25
Hammarström notes that Foucault ‘carried out all of his duties con-
scientiously and, I am convinced, to the satisfaction of everybody’
and, that while he had no interest in his colleagues’ research on lan-
guage, this was not an issue. Instead what was required was ‘a highly
intelligent and cultivated person’. Hammarström adds that ‘the other
academics in the department knew that he had published a book but

it was outside our sphere of influence’.26 Foucault treated the bleak-
ness of the Swedish weather with black humour: when asked by his
brother how many students he had, Foucault gave a figure but said
that numbers would reduce in the winter when the suicides began.27
The Maison de France and the Carolina Rediviva

The Alliance française comité d’Upsal had been set up in 1883 with
the express aim of spreading ‘the knowledge and flavour of French
language and culture’.28 The director of the Alliance française in
Uppsala from 1952–69 was Elsa Nordström, and her scrapbooks
of newspaper clippings and other ephemera give some indication of
events during Foucault’s time at the Maison de France. Foucault’s
arrival was featured in the local Upsala Nya Tidning newspaper, with
some information about his plans.29
Foucault organized cultural events such as film screenings, including
Cocteau’s L’Eternel retour;30 musical performances and gramophone
concerts including works by Maurice Ravel, songs, socializing and
coffee. Foucault also led several discussions at the Maison de France,
and would practise introductions to talks and prepare questions for
his friends in the audience.31 Yet he could also work with no notice.
Dumézil said that Foucault ‘spoke marvellously well. Above all, he
was blessed with an amazing gift for improvisation.’ Dumézil specif-
ically recalls one of the lectures as a ‘tour de force’, where Foucault
did not know the film he would introduce until 4pm, and when it
was revealed to be Sartre’s Les Mains sales, ‘he made a dazzling
presentation’.32 Foucault also initiated a sequence of productions of
contemporary French plays, many of which he directed, including
Eugène Labiche, La Grammaire, Jean Giraudoux, Le Cantique des
cantiques, Tristan Bernard, L’Anglais tel qu’on le parle, Molière, Le
Médecin volant, the medieval La Farce du cuvier, and works by Jean
Anouilh and Alfred de Musset.33
Foucault invited various distinguished figures to visit Uppsala,
including the writers Marguerite Duras, André Malraux, Alberto
Moravia, Nathalie Sarraute and Claude Simon, the classicist A. J.
Festugière, the singer Maurice Chevalier, journalist Jean Albert-Sorel
and former Prime Minister Pierre Mendès France.34 Foucault also
invited Barthes, whom he had met in Paris on one of his trips back,
through a friend from the Fondation Thiers, Robert Mauzi.35 Barthes’s
topic is not recorded, but his biographer Tiphaine Samoyault suggests
it would have either been on theatre or myth, given his personal and
professional interests at the time.36 Hyppolite gave lectures on ‘Hegel

and Kierkegaard in Contemporary French Thought’ and ‘History and
Existence’, also given in Stockholm, Oslo and Copenhagen.37 Albert
Camus came to Sweden to receive the Nobel prize, and famously
told a young Algerian student that ‘I have always condemned terror.
I must also condemn a terrorism that is carried out blindly, in the
streets of Algiers for example, and may one day strike my mother
or my family. I believe in justice, but I will defend my mother before
justice.’38 Foucault apparently attended that event, and Camus came
to Uppsala on this same trip.39
Foucault’s public lecture courses on theatre, love and religious expe-
rience, detailed above, were part of his cultural role. Hammarström
reports that these were not ‘orientated towards what the students had
to account for in examinations, but some attended for the intellectual
pleasure it gave them’, perhaps as ‘a useful listening comprehension
exercise’. He estimates that around thirty people attended the lec-
tures.40 Dumézil recalls that the lectures ‘made an impact’ and that,
extraordinarily, ‘mothers took their daughters to hear him speak’.41
Foucault also gave lectures in Stockholm, organized by the Institut
Français. The dates and titles were reported in the local press, and it
seems likely they repeated material given in Uppsala. In the 1955–6
academic year, Foucault’s Stockholm lectures were on ‘Contemporary
French Theatre’. The topics included the work of André Antoine and
the Théâtre Libre company in the late nineteenth century, symbolist
theatre, Jacques Copeau’s reforms, Albert Camus, Paul Claudel’s Le
Soulier de satin [The Satin Slipper], Jean Girandoux, and then two
final lectures on contemporary French theatre in the 1950s. In 1956–7
the Stockholm lectures were on literature more generally. Foucault
opened with two lectures on Marcel Proust’s À la Recherche du
temps perdu, continued with lectures on François Mauriac, Georges
Bernanos and Henry de Montherlant, André Malroux, the poetry
of Char, Saint-John Perse and Henri Michaux, and then in early
1957 turned back to theatre, discussing Copeau, Jean Vilar, Claudel,
Giraudoux, Montherlant and ending with lectures on Jean Anouilh,
Samuel Beckett and Eugene Ionesco.42 Initially held at the Institut
Français itself in its former home on Strandvägen (it has since moved
to Kommendörsgaten), from the beginning of 1956 most of the lec-
tures were given at the Borganskolan (City School, which closed in
1971) on Kungstensgatan in the city centre.
While there was generally no discussion following the Uppsala
lectures, Hammarström reports that Foucault ‘must have felt the
admiration of the listeners, in particular that of the older listeners,
for his performance as well as for the aspects of French culture he
dealt with. However, the admiration probably did not mean much
to him since he did not appear to be lacking in self-confidence’.43
With the exception of a few notes on Antoine and Théâtre Libre,
nothing seems to remain of the lectures themselves, or indeed any of
Foucault’s teaching from this period.44
One text that does survive was for a different purpose. On 25
June 1957 Foucault contributed to a broadcast on Sender Freies
Berlin [Radio Free Berlin]. A series on ‘Problems and Performances of
Modern French Science’ was organized by the classicist Jean Bollack,
then teaching at the Freie Universität Berlin, and other contributors
included Lévi-Strauss, Ricœur, Kostas Axelos, the physicist Jean-Loup
Delcroix, the physiologist Théophile Cahn, the geographer Marcel
Roncayolo, and the economist Alfred Sauvy.45 Foucault’s focus was
on anthropology, and his text was written in French, translated into
German and read by the transmission’s producer.46 The German text
is preserved in the archives of Bollack.47
Foucault began with a discussion of the lineage of the term anthro-
pology, drawing on his teaching work back in France earlier in the
decade. He noted that the term meant science of man, and while he
discussed some earlier understandings, and the work of Durkheim
and Mauss, his main examples in the lecture were Pierre Teilhard de
Chardin and Lévi-Strauss’s work on kinship and the incest taboo.
Teilhard was a curious figure, a Jesuit priest and philosopher who
trained as both a palaeontologist and geologist, whose book The
Phenomenon of Man had appeared, shortly after his death, in 1955.48
While Foucault’s lecture was for a general audience, and much was
descriptive of others’ work, it also gives a little insight into his own
thinking. He suggested that ‘from the beginning humanity is doomed
to meaning’, with an existence besieged by an ‘uncanny hyperbole
of constantly replicated signs that constantly function as symbols
in relation to one another, of such signs that mutually observe each
other furtively and reply to one another in a language with the same
vocabulary as the silence of the nights’.49
In the conclusion he briefly mentioned Bachelard’s work on the
elements, and made the suggestion that: ‘Georges Dumézil recreates
the grand architecture of Indo-European myths and has therefore
developed an œuvre whose contribution to anthropology is much
more considerable than Merleau-Ponty’s speculations on the physiol-
ogy and psychology of the reflex.’50 This appears to be the first time
Foucault mentioned Dumézil’s work.51 Given the earlier importance
of Merleau-Ponty, it also signals a break from the work he had con-
ducted in the first half of the 1950s.
Foucault was also working on what was to become the History of
Madness. Dumézil recalls that the most significant thing he did for
Foucault in bringing him to Uppsala was to give him access to the
‘incomparable library, the Carolina Rediviva’. Uppsala is the oldest
university in the Nordic countries, established by papal bull in 1477.
The collection of the Carolina Rediviva is extensive and Dumézil
particularly indicates ‘a very rich collection of medical books from
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries’.52 This is the ‘Bibliotheca
Walleriana’, bequeathed by Dr Erik Waller, a surgeon, who between
1940 and 1946 was the librarian at the Swedish Society of Medicine.
Between 1910 and 1950 he amassed an enormous private collec-
tion of material including medieval codices, the early printed books
known as incunabula, alba amicorum (friendship books), and manu-
scripts. The main collection comprised over 20,000 books and while
wide ranging in the history of science, its principal focus is medicine.
Uppsala librarian Tönnes Kleberg claimed that ‘it comprises prac-
tically all major works published in the realm of medicine before
1800, as well as a highly representative selection of later literature
on the subject’.53 In 1950 it was donated to the Carolina Rediviva
library, along with Waller’s similarly extensive collections of original
manuscripts and letters written by doctors and scientists, offprints of
articles, and a medal collection.54 Waller died in January 1955.
The catalogue of this collection was published a few months later
in November 1955, shortly after Foucault arrived. The catalogue is
not a mere typed inventory or card index, but a two-volume book
extending to almost a thousand pages and including several plates.55
In 1980, when asked to substantiate his sources for his treatment
of the idea of the ship of fools, Foucault replied to say that it was
not easy to do so, because ‘the documentation which I have utilized
for L’Histoire de la folie comes in large part from the library in
Uppsala and it is very difficult to find these references in Paris’.56
Eribon describes the collection as a ‘veritable mine’ for Foucault
and its catalogue as ‘a stroke of luck’.57 Macey too says the Uppsala
library is probably the ‘single place of birth’ for the book, although
he suggests that much of the research was done in Paris,58 presumably
during the summers and term breaks when Foucault left Uppsala.
Comparing the bibliography of the book and the catalogue of the
collection pushes Macey’s point further. There are 247 references
given by Foucault, less than a fifth of which are in the Bibliotheca
Walleriana.59 But only about half of those are the exact same edition,
Foucault often using a later reprint or a translation when Waller had
the original. In total Foucault references only about a quarter of one
per cent of the collection.60
Much of the book was certainly drafted in Sweden though, and
according to accounts of people who knew him, he did do much of

this work in the Carolina Rediviva, only a few minutes’ walk from
the Maison de France.61 Eribon outlines Foucault’s rhythm of work:
Every day at ten, after having worked for an hour with one of his secre-
taries, Jean-Christophe or Dani, he left for the Carolina. He remained
in the library until three or four in the afternoon, writing pages and
pages, and at night he kept right on writing. Always to music. Not
an evening went by that he did not listen to the Goldberg Variations.
Music for him meant Bach or Mozart. He wrote and rewrote, copying
his pages out neatly, endlessly reworking them: on the left a pile of
papers to do over, on the right the growing pile of revised pages.62
Foucault suggested in a 1968 interview with a Swedish journalist that

when he moved to Uppsala he expected ‘to spend the rest of his life
“between two suitcases”’, and particularly ‘never to touch a pen’.
But instead, it was ‘during the long Swedish nights, that I contracted
this mania and this filthy habit of writing for five or six hours a day
. . . I was now nailed to my desk’ (DE#54 I, 651–2). While somewhat
exaggerated, as he was clearly working hard before he left Paris, the
rhythm of work perhaps dates from this time. In a 1968 discussion
with Claude Bonnefoy, Foucault again talks of the relation between
writing and being in Sweden. He notes that he was ‘very bad’ at speak-
ing Swedish, and English was a language he spoke with ‘considerable
difficulty’. He therefore found it hard to express his thoughts and,
as a consequence, he began to see his native French not as simple as
‘the air we breathe’, but more as a system with rules and restrictions
and also possibilities (SBD 30/31–2). Foucault’s ambivalent attitude
to writing seems to date from this time. In his inaugural lecture at
the Collège de France Foucault pays tribute to Dumézil, both for his
writings and ideas (see Chapter 8), but also his writing practice: ‘since
it was he who encouraged me to work, at an age when I still believed
writing was a pleasure’ (OD 73/169). Dumézil acknowledges this as
a ‘beautiful formulation’ but insists that Foucault was working very
well before they met.63 Yet writing could be a struggle. Pinguet recalls
saying to Foucault at the time he was writing Histoire de la folie:
‘You have become a true writer. It must be nice to write.’ Apparently,
Foucault laughed and replied: ‘No it’s absolutely unbearable [insup-
portable], but it allows you to endure [supporter] everything else.’64
La Table Ronde and Sten Lindroth

The question of what Foucault might do with this developing work
was an open question throughout his time in Uppsala. Before he
left Paris in 1955, one further crucial thing had happened. Again, it
was down to Jacqueline Verdeaux. As Macey recounts, based on an
interview with her:
She was convinced that work and, more specifically, writing would have
a quasi-therapeutic effect, and would help to counteract his recurrent
depression. To that end, she introduced Foucault to Colette Duhamel,
an old schoolfriend of hers and now an editor at La Table Ronde, the
small, independent publishing house run by Roland Laudenbach.65
As Macey adds, ‘it is significant that the original suggestion came

from someone else’, noting that before the History of Madness, all
Foucault’s texts had been commissioned. ‘Although ambitious and
confident of his own future greatness, he obviously felt no great
compulsion to write.’66 The archives of La Table Ronde contain
contracts for two books, which were at least initially collaborative
between Verdeaux and Foucault, and bear the titles Histoire de la
folie and Histoire de la mort.67 The contracts were both signed on
30 November 1954, but neither book was ever submitted to that
press. The agreement seems to have been that they would deliver
one within two or three years, and the other sometime after. We
hear no more of the book on death, but the second is a crucial piece
of Foucault’s story towards the actual book of that title. What is
striking from the contract is that the book was not named as a
‘history of psychiatry’– h ow Foucault would often retrospectively
describe it (i.e. E 93; SBD 44/49–50), and how Verdeaux reports
it– but a ‘history of madness’.
La Table Ronde has an interesting history, dating back to the
Vichy era and its association with the right-wing Action française.
Its first title was Jean Anouilh’s Antigone, and in the post-war period
it published authors who had been blacklisted for collaboration or
pacifism by the Comité national des écrivains of the Resistance. It
was in strong opposition to both Les Temps modernes, communism
and Gaullism. Laudenbach, who also published under the pseudo-
nym Michel Braspart, strongly opposed Algerian independence.68
Foucault’s links to the press are therefore puzzling, and in contrast
to his later remarks about Maréchal Pétain and collaboration, even
if it he never actually delivered the manuscripts.69 The publisher Plon
part-owned La Table Ronde between 1949 and 1953 and, while

they were editorially distinct, there is a certain irony that Foucault’s
book would end up with Plon. In 1953 Colette and her husband,
the conservative politician Jacques Duhamel, bought the society,
with the press regaining editorial control from Plon in 1954; and in
December 1957 Gallimard bought a 50% share. In 1958 it became
part of Gallimard, initially continuing to publish independently and
then later as an imprint, a status it continues to hold today.70 After
Jacques Duhamel’s death in 1977, Colette Duhamel married Claude
Gallimard.
In a letter he sent to Verdeaux on 29 December 1956 Foucault
thanked her for sending some books from Sainte-Anne. This might
not be necessary in future, he suggests, as he praises the ‘magnificent
library’ in Uppsala. As a result, he might only need her to find a
couple of references in Paris. He says that he has ‘written about 175
pages’ and will ‘stop when I get to 300’. He suggests that the ques-
tion might be posed this way: ‘madness and experience of unreason
within the space opened up by Greek thought’. He adds some of the
themes to come– from Erasmus to Freud, to ‘some magic smoke
coming from the cauldrons of Macbeth’. He wonders if the publisher
‘would accept a book like that, with twenty-five to thirty pages of
Latino-erudite notes at the end?’ He ends by saying what he has is
an unreadable scribble which would have to be retyped, but wonders
if it is ready in ‘next June or September, could it be published in
December or January 58?’71 But a few months later, sometime in
1957, he abandoned this plan.
The main reason that Foucault did not deliver the agreed manu-
script appears to be that his research was developing in breadth and
depth and he did not stop at three hundred pages. Foucault met Sten
Lindroth, chair of history of ideas and science at Uppsala, whose
own thesis had been a history of the alternative medical theories
of Paracelsianism.72 Lindroth had spent time at the Sorbonne and
was fluent in French,73 and had written one of the first studies of
the Bibliotheca Walleriana.74 Indeed, Lindroth had contacted Waller
back in 1947 to ask if he was prepared to show his library to Uppsala
students, bemoaning the gaps in the university’s own collection of the
history of medicine.75
Lindroth agreed to have dinner and to discuss Foucault’s work.
Foucault told Dumézil in May 1957 that he had given Lindroth about
100 to 150 pages ‘on a trial basis’. He hoped Lindroth would be con-
tent and he could move to complete later that year.76 Eribon suggests
that this was ‘a few chapters’, drawn from ‘an enormous stack of
hand-written pages on very thin paper’.77 Unfortunately the response
was not what Foucault hoped, with Lindroth unimpressed by what

he read, finding its speculative approach in distinct contrast to his
own empirical approach to history. He did not think the material
could be presented as a thesis, and wrote to Foucault (who was now
in France for the summer) to explain his very serious reservations.
Foucault replied to thank him for ‘making me aware of the flaws in
my work’. He says that this is not a ‘fragment’ of a finished work,
but ‘rough work, a first draft’. He apologizes for the style, which he
concedes is ‘unbearable’ and that he has a flaw in ‘not being naturally
clear’, but says it will be reworked to ‘get rid of all the “convoluted”
expressions that managed to escape me’. Nonetheless, he says that he
had hoped that despite these problems he wanted Lindroth’s opinion
‘on the quality of the information and the guiding ideas’. But here
too he recognizes the criticisms, though his response is interesting in
clarifying what he thought he was doing:
It is clear that this latter point caused difficulties. There too, I was
wrong in not defining my project, which is not to write a history of the
developments of psychiatric science, but rather a history of the social,
moral, and imaginary context in which it developed.
But it seems to me that up until the nineteenth century, not to say
up to now, there has been no objective knowledge [savoir] of madness,
but only the formulation, in terms of scientific analogy, of a certain
experience (moral, social, etc.) of Unreason. Hence this very unobjec-
tive, unscientific, unhistorical method of dealing with the question. But
perhaps this undertaking is absurd and doomed in advance.78
Foucault continues to suggest other parts may be clearer, and he

was clearly willing to compromise on his vision for the book. But as
Macey reports, even though Foucault revised the work extensively,
‘Lindroth was unwilling to consider its acceptance.’79
The historian Gunnar Broberg tries to make sense of this, wonder-
ing if this was an instance of ‘Swedish cultural provincialism’. But
he defends Lindroth, who was at least interested in Foucault’s work,
and only had handwritten draft material to assess. Broberg adds that
Foucault did not gain acceptance, even in France, for some time. He
concludes that this should not be seen as the basis for ‘masochistic
discussions about Swedish cultural isolationism’, and suggests that
‘traditions were simply different’.80 There are conflicting reports on
what this meant at the time. Foucault’s secretary Jean-Christophe
Oberg says he did not seriously intend to defend in Sweden; while
fellow researcher Jean-François Miquel reported ‘that Lindroth’s
rejection was one of the main reasons for his departure’.81 Another
reason was that the teaching load was to be doubled from six to
twelve hours a week. Foucault was furious about this change. He

resigned on 10 October 1958.82
Although Foucault seems to have thought that Sweden would
be a better place for him, he was disappointed by what he found.
Hammarström provides a detailed account of Foucault’s final days
in Uppsala:
Foucault’s farewell talk at Maison de France. . . was a strange and

unexpected experience for the audience. Far from the friendly and
grateful goodbye talk we perhaps expected, he launched a violent
attack on studies at the University and aspects of life in Sweden. It was
not only performed in his usual precise and penetrating way but also
with an element of fury. I am sure that most of the listeners would have
felt stunned and wondered if they heard and understood correctly. The
possibility of hurting Swedish sensitivities was, however, limited by the
fact there were few and not very specific examples of Swedish short-
comings and also by the fact that the listeners would have had correctly
the impression that Foucault’s aim was, at least partly, to interpret, in
his own way, certain aspects of any Western type of society rather than
to attack the University of Uppsala and the Swedish society.83
Hammarström goes on to note that this was not discussed much at

the time, and that he wonders how Foucault could have formed much
of a view of Sweden when he barely knew the country and ‘had not
bothered about learning Swedish. He could certainly not read a news-
paper or understand a news bulletin on the radio.’ But he wonders
if ‘an unsuccessful attempt to obtain a doctorate. . . which was not
known to the audience at Maison de France, could have contributed
to his anger’.84
Hammarström’s recollections are valuable, but on one point he
seems to be misled. He cites a 1993 newspaper article by Johan
Bergström that discusses an unpublished manuscript by Foucault,
apparently entitled Travel to the Gardens of Madness [En resa till
vansinnets trädgårdar]. Bergström outlines the content of this man-
uscript, which contained transcriptions of Foucault’s discussions
with a Polish-born translator and sociologist, Danuta B., who was
institutionalized at the Ulleråker mental hospital outside of Uppsala.
Foucault certainly knew the hospital, remarking in 1972 that ‘fifteen
years ago, on the road which goes from Uppsala to Stockholm, I saw
an establishment which looked like a very comfortable French school
building’ (DE#105 II, 306). Bergström suggests the manuscript con-
tains ‘all the themes which will define Foucault’s scholarly work’.85
In it, according to Bergström, Foucault was critical of the work of
those writing history in the University Library, which he describes as
a penitentiary: ‘Already known facts are restructured, footnotes are

copied, etc. but nothing of importance comes out of it.’ Bergström
says that in 1993 the manuscript, found in a blue folder, was held
in Hamburg at the Institut für Sozialwissenschaft, Heilbronnestrasse
23, Altona. It had been given to the archivist Manfred Kantor by
Foucault.
Hammarström takes Bergström at face value, and wonders if this
was the text that Foucault showed to Lindroth. He recalls that in
Foucault’s farewell talk he ‘particularly mentioned the scholars at
Carolina whose only interest was to add masses of footnotes and to
get them absolutely correct. One may speculate that the manuscript
was Travel to the Gardens of Madness and that Lindroth had been
shocked not only by the lack of footnotes but also by the lack of exact
facts.’86 Hammarström adds that ‘one hopes that the manuscript will
soon be available in a published form’.87 However, while there are
similarly named institutions, there is no Institut für Sozialwissenschaft
in Hamburg, and no road called Heilbronnestrasse in Altona or else-
where in the city. Nobody seems to know who Kantor was. Indeed,
the entire existence of the manuscript is a fiction. Bergström’s piece
was in a series on ‘imaginary books’. Not just a book that did not
exist because it was not published, but because it was never written.
But the History of Madness was written, and in a 1961 inter-
view, Foucault suggested that while a ‘history of psychiatry’ had
been proposed to him, his response was to suggest instead ‘a book on
the relationship between doctors and the insane. The eternal debate
between reason and madness’ (DE#5 I, 168; FL 7; see E 93). While
certainly what his work became, this was not the original plan. In
1968 Foucault returns to this story but phrases it in a slightly different
way:
The History of Madness is something of an accident in my life. I

wrote it when I hadn’t yet discovered the pleasure of writing. I had
simply agreed to write a short history of psychiatry as an author, a
short text, quick and easy, that would have been about psychiatric
knowledge, medicine, and doctors. But faced with the poverty of such a
story, I asked myself the following, slightly different question: what has
been the mode of coexistence, of correlation and complicity, between
psychiatry and the insane? How have madness and psychiatry been
formed in parallel to one another, one against the other, opposite one
another, one capturing the other? (SBD 44/49–50)
There are some inconsistencies in his accounts. In one recollection,

Foucault even mentions the contract for a history of psychiatry was
with Plon.88 Was it a book for students, a non-academic work, or
something he always intended to become a thesis? The archive is

clear: the contract signed with La Table Ronde was for a history of
madness.89 Foucault’s abandonment of this contract might be seen as
a footnote in his story. But it was the spur to get him writing, what
Macey calls ‘the germ that developed into Histoire de la folie’.90
Warsaw
Following his disappointment in Uppsala with Lindroth, and his
general unhappiness with the country, Foucault consulted Dumézil.
Since recommending him to Uppsala, Dumézil had remained close
to Foucault and took a genuine interest in his work.91 Dumézil read
some parts of the draft manuscript and understood the Swedish
reservations. He suggested that Foucault submit in France, as did
Foucault’s colleague Bengt Hasselrot.92
Foucault left Uppsala in October 1958 with the basic research nearly
complete.93 But the manuscript needed comprehensive rewriting, and
its final form did not come until his next cultural posting in Warsaw
(C 22/23). Dumézil had again been important in getting Foucault this
post. His recommendation to his former colleague Philippe Rebeyrol
at the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs on the Quai d’Orsay,
along with strong references from Uppsala, was deemed sufficient to
appoint Foucault to a new role at the University, directing the Centre
de civilisation française.94 Foucault later recalls that 1958–9 was the
decisive period for the book’s writing, rather than its research.95
Warsaw had still not recovered from its wartime destruction, and
the country was undergoing a major change. Władysław Gomułka
had been released from prison and was back in power, developing a
post-Stalinist communism. In November 1958, Foucault wrote to a
friend that the situation was like that of Alfred Jarry’s play Ubu Roi,
‘set in Poland, that is nowhere’, that it was like being in a ‘prison’, or
rather being outside one, unable to get in, and that he had been placed
in a ‘socialist palace’. He added that ‘I am working on my “Madness”
which is in danger, in this outpouring of insanity, of becoming a little
more like what it always pretended to be.’96 That same month he also
wrote to Dumézil complaining about the long hours that he was putting
into the revision, and the challenges of writing in a room at the Hotel
Bristol. Frequent power cuts meant that much of the writing was done
by candlelight. ‘Everything is simply terrifying here: poverty, filth, rude-
ness, disorder, neglect. And such a loneliness as I thought impossible.’97
This period has recently been the subject of Remigiusz Ryziński’s
2017 book Foucault w Warszawie [Foucault in Warsaw].98 Some
of Ryziński’s account shows how little information there is in the

archives he consulted, including the Instytut Pamięci Narodowej
[Institute of National Remembrance], the University of Warsaw,
French Institutes in Warsaw and Kraków, French Embassy, and
the Polish Press Agency. Much of Ryziński’s study is spent tracing
the young men that Foucault met there. For any future biographer of
Foucault, the book provides a lot of detail, but it is often speculative
and sometimes avowedly fictional, and frustrating for a more intel-
lectual approach to his work. Part of this is down to the paucity of
written evidence. An article by Anna Krakus and Cristina Vatulescu
provides a bit more information, but again indicates how little there is
to be found in the archives. They report, for example, that the Centre
des Archives Diplomatiques in Nantes has no records relating to the
centre Foucault directed.99
Indeed, little is known about Foucault’s academic work in Warsaw,
other than rewriting his thesis. On 2 December 1958, Foucault wrote
to the rector of the university outlining the events scheduled at the
Centre (reproduced in SP 82). They included similar events to his
time in Uppsala, including his course on contemporary French theatre
and film screenings. Foucault organized visiting lectures by the writer
Jean Cassou, director of the Musée National d’Art Moderne, the
head of the manuscripts department of the BNF (a Monsieur Porcter),
and the director of the research laboratory at the Louvre. Foucault
also hosted some colloquia, along with organizing an exhibition to
commemorate Guillaume Apollinaire, who died forty years before,
with Jean Bourilly of the French embassy. Foucault gave a lecture on
Apollinaire as part of this commemoration, which travelled to other
cities including Kraków and Gdánsk.100
A partial manuscript of this lecture is preserved.101 As well as noting
the commemoration, Foucault notes that Apollinaire’s mother was
Polish, and that he spoke the language. He also discusses his trav-
els around Germany and Central Europe at the age of twenty-two,
briefly mentions links to other thinkers, authors and poets, discusses
his poetry and his relationship with visual artists– Apollinaire wrote
on art, and famously coined the terms ‘cubism’ and ‘surrealism’. He
was wounded in the war in 1916 and died from the ‘Spanish’ flu on 9
November 1918. The lecture notes preserved are brief and fragmen-
tary, and it is not clear how much Foucault was fulfilling a duty rather
than speaking about a figure in whom he was especially interested.
Foucault does not seem to mention him elsewhere, though there is an
oblique reference in his work on René Magritte, where he discusses
calligrams (DE#53 II, 637). Foucault ends this lecture manuscript
with the debt that Char owes to Apollinaire.
For his ongoing research, Foucault used the libraries at the

University and the Institute of Literary Research at the Polish
Academy of Sciences.102 He knew the philosopher Leszek Kołakowski,
who was at the time working at the Academy, and sometimes bor-
rowed foreign-language books from him, as well as from the Klub
Międzynarodowej Prasy i Książki (the International Press and Book
Club).103 Finishing his thesis in this situation, with the difficulties of
accessing publications and other sources, and the material constraints
he outlined to Dumézil, was undoubtedly challenging.104 Despite this,
Foucault made good progress on the manuscript, and by the time he
left Warsaw in 1959 its revision was just about complete.
Jeannette Colombel suggests that the final work on the manuscript
of Folie et déraison was done ‘in the proximity of sites of psychiatric
internment intended for dissidents’.105 This would suggest that the
treatment of the mad was always a political issue for Foucault. Indeed
in July 1978 Foucault himself recalls this Polish context: ‘I could not
help but think, as was writing it, about what I could see around me.’106
But, as Macey argues, neither the text or interviews of this time ‘sug-
gests that this was in fact the case; Foucault is clearly reinterpreting
and reinscribing both his book and his experience within the context
of the mid 1970s.’107 However, Ryziński suggests that Foucault did
make enquiries about mental hospitals, including the Tworki one
outside Warsaw, while in the country. Foucault also apparently vis-
ited Auschwitz-Birkenau during this time, and the camps of course
interred the mentally ill and homosexuals as well as Jews.108
The French ambassador to Poland between 1958 and 1962 was
Étienne Buran des Roziers, who had not met Foucault before, but was
immediately impressed, recalling in particular the ‘dazzling’ lecture on
Apollinaire. He made Foucault an informal cultural attaché to cover
for Bourilly, who ironically had been given leave to complete a thesis.
It was a post Buran des Roziers offered to formalize for Foucault
when Bourilly left. But, while Foucault discussed this idea, with the
view to a longer country-specific role, rather than the more itinerant
postings common to the diplomatic service, it did not develop quickly
enough– a scandal soon ended this idea.109
Indeed, the best-known story about Foucault’s time in Poland is the
reason for his hurried departure. Buran des Roziers is evasive about
it, mentioning only ‘an unforeseen circumstance’, and Eribon says
that the story is ‘rather muddled’.110 Defert suggests that Foucault’s
‘thick manuscripts on imprisonment, along with the company he
keeps, worry Gomułka’s police’ (C 23/25). As well as dissident con-
tacts and his research, this concern was in part due to his sexuality.
While homosexuality was not illegal, it still occupied a somewhat
problematic place in Catholic society and the authorities monitored

people. Within the university and associated artistic circles it was
tolerated, but Foucault was warned not to mix with people outside
this group. It was not advice he followed, with Macey reporting a
story of a Paris fonctionnaire who burst into Foucault’s room to find
him in bed with a local man.111 Ryziński indicates a number of sexual
contacts and suggests Foucault had two lives: the professional one of
the day, when he could only speak of philosophy and literature, and
the night one of entertaining and young men.112
This behaviour gave the Polish authorities the chance to set
Foucault up. One of Foucault’s partners was a man simply known by
his first name, Jurek. There are various reports that he was a student,
struggling actor, translator, or worked in a bookshop or library. All
accounts suggest he was also a police agent.113 According to Defert,
his father had been one of the officers killed by the Soviets at Katyń
in the war, and therefore was suspect as a bourgeois-nationalist. As
the price for his university education he had agreed to work for the
Służba Bezpieczeństwa, the Security Service of the Polish Ministry
of Internal Affairs (SB). He entrapped Foucault, and the two men
were discovered by the SB at the Hotel Bristol. Fearing a scandal,
Foucault was told by Buran des Roziers to leave the country within
twenty-four hours, though with an excellent reference.114 Yet Jurek
visited Foucault in Paris in 1960, supposedly to report back on him,
and ‘burst into tears on seeing the PCF building; he had been told that
the Party was clandestine’.115 Jurek confessed to Foucault he had been
the informant; Foucault apparently replied to say he would write his
own report, which Jurek could translate into Polish.116
A Polish journalist claims to have found out who Jurek was, though
since the man was dead and had left behind a wife and children, does
not reveal his identity.117 Ryziński’s research provides a few more
details of the general situation; Krakus and Vatulescu are more scep-
tical given the lack of archival traces. According to Ryziński, Foucault
was monitored from his first arrival in the country, though this was
not uncommon for any foreign visitor. The Hotel Bristol, with its
largely international guests, was regularly surveilled and bugged.
Ryziński reports that
Foucault was aware of this but he ignored it. Defert said Foucault often
remembered this as a fascinating absurdity of the system. He knew he
was followed, his friends were warning him not to trust the hotel staff
or waiters. It seems Foucault was ignoring these warnings, he was not
afraid and that he even put himself out there on purpose. He was not
hiding who he was, but sharing everything openly.118
Ryziński adds that an investigation into ‘foreign homosexuals’ began

after Foucault had left Warsaw, and this explains the reason Jurek
later visited him in Paris. The report on Foucault notes that he was an
ex-teacher at the university, his address in Warsaw, and that he left
Poland in 1960 for Paris (actually 1959 for Hamburg, then Paris). The
file specifies some of his contacts during his time in Poland.119 Ryziński
also notes that Foucault’s successor to the University role, Pierre
Arnaud, was known for having relationships with Polish women, but
because Foucault was the only one forced to leave the country, this
was clearly to do with his homosexuality.120 Nonetheless, Ryziński
suggests that while this alone would not have been enough, the nature
of his research gave them sufficient reason to use it against him.
Ryziński speculates that the enquiries of the SB into the pathologies
of homosexuals provided Foucault with a rich context in which write,
even claiming: ‘Could Michel Foucault’s thesis have been written in a
better place than socialist Poland?’121
History of Madness
The History of Madness is a book that is almost impossible to sum-
marize.122 Foucault does a remarkable job in Mental Illness and
Psychology in 1962, which will be discussed in Chapter 8. Essentially,
Foucault treats the question of madness in three main historical
periods. The first, and most brief, is the European Renaissance, in
which madness had elements of freedom, both in the social life of the
mad and in literary and artistic expression. The mad often wandered
between towns, sometimes represented by the idea of a ‘ship of fools’.
Treatment of the mad was erratic: there was no overall model, and
while they were sometimes hospitalized, they were also expelled, or
simply tolerated within society.
But this began to change in the seventeenth century, when the mad
were increasingly incarcerated. This was often in the old leprosaria
that had lost their previous purpose, and had then held the venereally
diseased in a ‘moral space of exclusion’ (HM 18/8). At the same
time, there were shifts in philosophical and literary treatment of the
mad, where the advent of the age of reason marginalized unreason.
Foucault calls this the Classical Age, of which the founding of the
Hôpital Général in 1656 and Descartes’s Meditations in 1641 are two
symptomatic events. ‘Madness was excluded, leaving no trace, no scar
on the surface of thought’ (HM 156/138). The mad were not the only
ones incarcerated, and in his discussion of the ‘Great Confinement’
and the ‘Correctional World’ Foucault anticipates many of the themes
of his later work as he indicates that ‘the venereal, the debauched, the
dissolute, homosexuals, blasphemers, alchemists and libertines’ (HM
116/101, see 124/108), were the initial people incarcerated, later to
be replaced with the mad, criminals, the poor, vagabonds and the
unemployed. These unruly elements disrupted the workings of bour-
geois society, ‘the ordering of social space’ (HM 74/62).
Foucault underscores that ‘confinement did not simply play the
negative role of exclusion, but also the positive role of organization.
Its practices and regulations constituted a domain of experience that
had unity, coherence and function’ (HM 96/82). There is also a muted
political economy to the analysis, one which is perhaps underplayed
in readings of the book (HM 82/68–9). Foucault provides a range
of examples to illustrate his themes. Some of these perhaps build on
the teaching he did outside of France in the years he was writing it.
The reading of Racine’s Andromaque, for example, may well have
originated in teaching that play to students in Uppsala (HM 263–
7/245–9).123 Foucault provides some quite detailed discussions of the
relation between madness and medicine in this period, anticipating
some of themes of his next major book Birth of the Clinic.
Part of the shift from the classical age comes from what Foucault
calls ‘the great fear’, which emerged in the mid eighteenth century.
As Foucault suggests: ‘It was a fear formulated in medical terms, but
deep down it was animated by a whole moral myth’ (HM 375/355).
It was supposed to be a contagion that could spread from houses of
confinement, a prison fever, spread perhaps by the transportation of
convicts or by chain gangs. Diseases were circulating, bringing the
themes of the book back to its beginning: ‘Houses of confinement
were no longer simply the lazar house on the edges of towns, but
became themselves a form of leprosy that scarred the face of the city’
(HM 375/355). The reform movement that followed was not to get
rid of the houses of confinement, but rather to try to provide them as
a source of disease, or evil– two senses of the French word mal (HM
377–9/357–9). The idea of ventilation appears in medical literature at
this time, not just in relation to the question of contagion, but more
in terms of the question of ‘moral communication’ (HM 379/359).
In the final parts of the book Foucault turns to the late eighteenth
century and the supposed liberation of the mad. Indeed, in the orig-
inal preface Foucault suggests the founding of the Hôpital Général
and the breaking of the chains at Bicêtre in 1794 as indicative dates
to bookend the narrative (FD1, viii; DE#4 I, 165; HM–/xxxiii). The
latter is the (perhaps apocryphal) liberation by Pinel, and Foucault’s
other key example is the idealized building of the York Retreat by the
Tuke family.124 This was the supposedly more humane treatment of
the mentally ill. There are differences between Tuke and Pinel, espe-
cially around the role of religion (HM 511/491), but Foucault’s point
in this key chapter is to disrupt the way they are usually read. He
notes that there is a different kind of incarceration taking place here,
one that is internal and moral, rather than external and physical (i.e.
HM 502/482, 507/487). Instead of their work just opening up the
asylum to medical knowledge, it was the powers that accompanied
the knowledge that Foucault wants to stress, ‘an order that was moral
and social’ (HM 525/505).
No matter how much contemporary psychiatry and psychoanalysis
try to reinvent themselves as sciences and disavow their historical
roots, their work retains a lineage to earlier approaches. ‘Madness
was to be punished in asylums, even if its innocence was proclaimed
outside. For a long time to come, and at least until our days, it
was imprisoned in a moral world’ (HM 523/503). Yet at the same
time, the shift to the asylum in the modern age is the beginning of
a distinctive approach to mental illness, rather than seeing it as one
disease among others (HM 189/171).Interestingly, Foucault sees the
emergence of a new voice of madness as speaking in ‘an anthropo-
logical language’ (HM 535/516). While in the Renaissance madness
had appeared in artistic works, and in the classical age madness had
been silenced, now the earlier, raw experience of madness again finds
itself expressed in some forms of art (HM 535/516, 537/518). In the
final pages of the book Foucault discusses figures such as Friedrich
Hölderlin, Vincent van Gogh, Gérard de Nerval, Nietzsche, Roussel
and Antonin Artaud. And the book closes with some enigmatic com-
ments on the relation between an artistic œuvre and madness:
Ruse and new triumph of madness. The world that believes that mad-
ness can be measured, and justified by means of psychology, and yet
it must justify itself when confronted by madness, for its efforts and
agonies have to measure up to the excess [démesure] of the œuvres of
men like Nietzsche, Van Gogh and Artaud. And nothing in itself, and
above all nothing that it can know of madness, serves to shows that
these œuvres of madness justify it. (HM 557/538).
There are many other elements in the book, which repays rereading
and consideration in relation to the themes of Foucault’s later writing
as well as the work that came before. Foucault stresses that Pinel
and Tuke are ‘not a destination’, and that his book is not concluding
with the discussion of artistic figures (HM 531/512). Indeed, the
book opens up multiple paths which Foucault would later explore
in detail.125 The discussion of hospitals and medicine links directly
to Birth of the Clinic; the discussion of literature and art continues
through many of his other writings of the 1960s; the theme of the
organization of thought is developed in The Order of Things; and the
historical approach employed here is consolidated in The Archaeology
of Knowledge. A concern with incarceration and a disciplined society,
and the few comments on sexuality, lead to themes of the 1970s and
beyond. Foucault took a lot of notes, seemingly from this period, on
sodomy, homosexuality and hermaphrodites.126 These themes were
perhaps intended for a future volume at the time, but reappear in his
work many years later, as he pursued the project on the history of
sexuality.
It is a book that ranges widely across historical and literary sources,
makes some use of the Uppsala collection, but much more of the
riches of Paris’s libraries, and showcases Foucault’s breadth, even if
not always his care. Indeed, Macey has suggested that ‘the display of
erudition is one of its best defences’, in that his use of archival mate-
rial and obscure sources makes it hard to criticize him. So too does
his range, with few readers who could challenge him on Paracelsus,
Sade and Artaud.127 But as Macey goes on to add, the reading of Sade
owes much to Blanchot and the references to both Sade and Molière
are incorrect.128
The distance from the work he had done in the early 1950s is
profound. Neither Kuhn nor Binswanger are mentioned in the book,
and Foucault has clearly moved some distance from his interest in
Daseinsanalysis, phenomenology and psychology. But traces of that
earlier experience can be found here– it is hard not to glimpse the
Swiss asylums in Münsterlingen and Kreuzlingen behind the descrip-
tions of the supposed liberations of Tuke and Pinel. Similarly, while
they are not mentioned, the experience Foucault gained working with
the Verdeaux couple at Sainte-Anne and Fresnes arguably lies behind
some of its discussions of the relation between illness, treatment and
evaluation. It is also likely to have informed his claims about the
absence of the voice of the mad from psychology. Malebranche is
briefly mentioned in just a few places, more as a contrast to Descartes
than as a key reference in himself (HM 195/177, 247–8/229, 262
n.2/619 n. 76).
More recent theoretical influences are entirely absent in explicit
form– Husserl, Heidegger, Bataille are unmentioned; Dumézil only
in the preface; Nietzsche largely as a man who himself went mad. The
knowledge deployed in the book comes from an extensive reading of
a diverse literature, in part for his early publications and the teaching
he did at Lille and the ENS, and intensely in the years that followed.
Given the historical work he had now done, the claims made in
Maladie mentale et personnalité, and Foucault’s hopes for a different
approach within psychology, had to be jettisoned. This would have

important implications for Foucault’s attitude to that earlier book,
and its re-edition in 1962, as Chapter 8 will discuss in detail. There is
also an implicit nod back to an earlier project, perhaps the abandoned
one for La Table Ronde: ‘In the reconstitution of this experience of
madness, a history of the conditions of possibility of psychology
wrote itself as though of its own accord’ (FD1 ix; DE#4 I, 166; HM–/
xxxiv).
One of Foucault’s intended titles for Folie et déraison had been
‘L’Autre Tour de folie’– another trick or twist of madness, taken
from Pascal’s Pensées, used as the epigraph to the original preface:
‘Men are so necessarily mad that it would be mad by another twist of
madness not to be mad’ (FD1 i; DE#4 I, 159; HM–/xxvii).129 Foucault
uses this in his own opening sentences:
We need a history of that other trick of madness– of that other trick
through which men, in the gesture of sovereign reason that locks up
their neighbour, communicate and recognize each other in the merci-
less language of non-madness; we need to identify the moment of that
expulsion, before it was definitely established in the reign of truth,
before it was brought back to life by the lyricism of protestation. To
try to recapture, in history, this degree zero of the history of madness,
when it was undifferentiated experience, the still undivided experi-
ence of the division itself. To describe, from the origin its curve, that
‘other trick’ which, on either side of its movement, allows Reason and
Madness to fall away, like things henceforth foreign to each other,
deaf to any exchange, almost dead to each other. (FD1 i; DE#4 I, 159;
HM–/xxvii)
Foucault then argues that psychopathology cannot help us to under-

stand this question, implicitly rejecting much of what he had argued
in the early 1950s. It is the ‘gesture that divides madness’ that is
‘constitutive’, not the science of mental illness that develops from
that division. The voice of madness is silenced, and ‘the language of
psychiatry, which is a monologue by reason about madness, could
only come into existence in such a silence’ (FD1 i-ii; DE#4 I, 159–60;
HM–/xxviii). Famously, then, Foucault suggests his purpose: ‘My
intention was not to write a history of that language, but rather the
archaeology of that silence’ (FD1 ii; DE#4 I, 160; HM–/xxviii).
7
Hamburg, Kant
On 1 October 1959, Foucault was appointed director of the Institut

Français in Hamburg, only a couple of weeks after his father’s death
(C 23/25). On his return from Warsaw, Foucault had gone back to
Rebeyrol on the Quai d’Orsay to ask for a German posting and, out
of several possibilities, chose Hamburg. Dumézil again seems to have
mediated this .1 The Institut had only been open for a few years, set up
after the war as part of a programme of cultural exchange.2 Foucault
replaced Victor Hell, who moved to Mainz, having only been in
Hamburg a year.3 Foucault’s first days saw a ‘French–German week’
with concerts, ballet, films and plays.4
As a next step for getting his now completed manuscript on madness
supported as a French thesis, Foucault contacted Hyppolite. There is
some confusion about dates, but the initial contact with Hyppolite
was likely when he visited Paris from Hamburg over Christmas
1959.5 Although Hyppolite admired the work, he said that he was not
the right person to support it as a thesis. In a piece he presented on
‘Pathologie Mentale et Organisation’ in 1955 he continually stressed
he was approaching this topic as a philosopher and not as a spe-
cialist.6 Hyppolite suggested that Foucault contact Canguilhem, and
Foucault did just that. Macey suggests that Canguilhem’s December
1956 lecture ‘What is Psychology?’, first published in 1958, may have
been the reason he was contacted about the thesis.7 Foucault spent
Christmas back in France, and so could potentially have attended the
lecture, which critiqued Lagache’s programme for a unified French
science.8 But it was probably Hyppolite’s awareness of this lecture
that was important.
Hamburg, Kant 149
Canguilhem was sent an entire version of the thesis, then of 943

typed pages, plus forty pages of appendices and bibliography.9 Eribon
reports that while Canguilhem was initially sceptical, reading it was
‘a real shock’, and that he was ‘convinced that he was looking at truly
first-rate work’.10 Canguilhem recalls that he was its third reader,
after Dumézil and Hyppolite.11 ‘I had previously reflected and written
on the normal and pathological. Reading Foucault fascinated me
while revealing to me my limits.’ He therefore agreed to be the rap-
porteur, though is adamant that Foucault changed nothing before it
was defended.12 Defert quotes him as telling Foucault simply: ‘Don’t
change anything, it is a thesis’ (C 22/24).
With the support of Canguilhem, Foucault was now in a much
stronger position. But the decision to submit in France came with
an additional requirement. The doctorat ès lettres is a higher doc-
torate, sometimes called a doctorat d’État, and closer to a German
Habilitationsschrift or an Anglophone DSc or DLitt than a modern
PhD. Before it could be defended, Foucault also had to submit a
secondary or complementary thesis. This would be a translation of
Kant’s Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View, along with a
long introduction. Hyppolite agreed to sponsor this secondary thesis,
which was much closer to his own interests and approach. The work
for this was completed in Hamburg: Foucault wrote to Hyppolite in
April 1960 claiming he was close to completing the translation and
had already begun the commentary.13 The story of the defence of the
theses will be picked up in Chapter 8, but this time in Hamburg is
important, not least for the work on Kant. The most extensive discus-
sion of this period is in an article by the historian Rainer Nicolaysen,
though he notes that there are limited archives, including of the
Institut français.14
Hamburg was much closer to Paris than Warsaw or Uppsala, the
library resources and working conditions were much better than
Warsaw, and unlike those positions, Foucault could speak and read
the language, although he taught in French.15 Foucault had similar
duties to previous posts: lectures, hosting events, and organizing cul-
tural activities. At the University of Hamburg Foucault was a guest
lecturer who received student fees, rather than a salary.16 The teaching
duties were not extensive: a one-hour lecture and two hours of semi-
nars a week, and the semesters were short– r unning from November
to February and May to July. In the winter semester of 1959–60
Foucault took over Hell’s seminar on Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert
Camus, and his lectures on the modern novel in France; while in the
summer semester 1960 Foucault gave a lecture course and related
seminar on ‘Eighteenth-Century Political Thought’.17
150 Hamburg, Kant
One of Foucault’s students, Jürgen Schmidt-Radefeldt reported on

his teaching to Nicolaysen:
In his seminar on French existentialist drama and philosophy Foucault

treated Sartre’s Les Mouches (1943) and ‘L’Existentialisme est un
humanisme’ (1946), Camus’s Le malentendu (1944), Caligula (1945),
L’État de siège (1948), Les Justes (1949) and Les Possédés (1959).
Schmidt-Radefeldt describes them as follows: Foucault considered
these plays as ‘theatre of ideas with many assassins and mad-people’,
he highlighted the quest for happiness, manifestation of fear, guilt
and madness (la folie– above all through the dramatization of
Dostoyevsky’s demons in Les Possédés), in Les Justes it was the power
of women over men, justice, civic courage, resistance as problems in
themselves.18
Foucault also brought in material from his earlier lectures on theatre

and poetry, mentioning Michaux and Char, as well as his emerging
interest in Roussel, whose work he had discovered in summer 1957,
on a visit back to Paris from Uppsala (DE#343 IV, 608; DL–/187).
His political thought class did not discuss Voltaire and Diderot, but
focused on Rousseau, though even here he chose not the major works,
but the lesser-known 1780 dialogue Rousseau, juge de Jean-Jaques,
which Foucault would later edit and introduce.19 While that introduc-
tion gives a sense of his teaching here, no courses are preserved from
this period. This seems to be because they were largely improvised,
with Foucault only consulting notes occasionally.20 Foucault also gave
a public lecture on ‘Apollinaire et l’art moderne’ on 11 May 1960.21
For the winter semester 1960–1, Foucault announced a course on
Baudelaire and a seminar on ‘French Poetry from Baudelaire to the
Present’, but he left Hamburg for a position at the University of
Clermont-Ferrand before they were delivered. He was replaced as
director by Jean-Louis Gradies.22
As part of his work at the Institut Foucault staged Pierre Carlet
de Marivaux’s La Colonie, Claude-André Puget’s Nuit et jour and
Cocteau’s L’École des veuves;23 organized film screenings and con-
certs; and as he had in Uppsala, and to a lesser degree in Warsaw,
used his role to invite some interesting visitors. They included
Barthes, Hyppolite, Gabriel Marcel, the detective novelist Jean
Bruce, the Prix Goncourt winner Roger Ikor, Michel Butor, Charles
Moeller, and Paul-Émile Victor on French expeditions to Greenland
and Antarctica.24 Raymond Aron gave a lecture at the Kunsthalle
to which Foucault was invited just days after his arrival.25 Between
January and March 1960, the Institut hosted a series of lectures on
French art, including ones by Armin Wick on Cézanne and Picasso,
Hamburg, Kant 151
Gilbert Kahn on the Chartres cathedral and the Loire chateaux, Pierre
Gascar on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, and Pierre Savi on medieval
stained-glass windows.26
Robbe-Grillet was also invited by Foucault to give a lecture on
‘Towards a new Realism’ on 20 November 1959.27 The visit to
Hamburg is very briefly recalled in his memoirs. An unnamed consul
general mistakes Robbe-Grillet’s wife for his daughter, but Foucault
is unmentioned.28 Many years later Foucault recalled that he also
took Robbe-Grillet to the fairground and the ‘maze of mirrors [le
labyrinth de glace]’, that is the Spiegel-Irrgarten in Hamburg, noting
that this featured as the ‘starting point’ of Robbe-Grillet’s novel Dans
le labyrinthe (DE#343 IV, 600; DL–/172). Given that the novel was
published in October 1959, shortly before the visit, this is undoubt-
edly a coincidence rather than a cause.29 The editors of Dits et écrits
note that Robbe-Grillet subsequently sent a dedicated copy of that
book to Foucault as a token of thanks; surely the reason for the
misrecollection.30 In any case it would be more accurate to describe
the labyrinth as a structuring device for the novel;31 as it was in
Foucault’s own study of Roussel.
Foucault also befriended local intellectuals, including his colleagues
Jean-Marie Zemb and Kahn, and the author and screenwriter Rolf
Italiaander.32 Zemb would return to France in 1961 and was elected
to the Collège de France in 1986. Some of the engravings made by
Italiaander’s Congolese students were displayed at the Institut français
when Italiaander gave a lecture on African art.33 A Christmas 1960
letter from Foucault to Italiaander was published in 1963; Italiaander
wrote a tribute to Foucault after his death.34 Most significantly, Defert
claims that Italiaander helped with the Kant translation.35
Even though homosexuality was illegal in West Germany, Foucault
had a much more open life. Gascar wrote a piece about his visit,
from Foucault meeting him at the station to a visit to the Kunsthalle
museum, and a tour of the red-light district of the Reeperbahn in
Saint Pauli. This was apparently a common trip for his French visi-
tors, as he led his guests to strip-clubs, gay cafés and drag-bars, where
he was known as ‘Herr Doktor’, despite not yet having submitted his
thesis.36 Italiaander, who was also gay, gave Foucault a lot of insider
advice about the Saint Pauli area, which they explored together.37
He suggests that Foucault gave him new insight into the place, and
suggests it was a missed opportunity for the city not to commission
him to write an analysis of the area.38 Yet, even on their first meeting,
Foucault had received guests at the Institut for a glass of wine, served
by ‘an attractive young girl’ from Hamburg who was clearly close to
him. As Foucault confided later that evening: ‘My girlfriend is not
152 Hamburg, Kant
a woman, but a young man.’ Italiaander recognizes that ‘even for a

foreigner’ this was ‘extremely courageous’ at this time of ‘medieval
moralities’.39
Situating Kant
Given that Foucault was required to write a secondary thesis, it is
intriguing that he chose to return to Kant and anthropology, on
which he had lectured some years before in Lille and Paris. Given
his preoccupations of the later 1950s, a project on Heidegger or
Nietzsche, or even on Roussel, might have seemed more in keeping
with his interests. Yet, perhaps Foucault wanted to demonstrate his
philosophical standing in a more traditional way than the History of
Madness. For many years, Foucault’s translation was the main French
edition, though there was an earlier out-of-print translation, and
there are now two others.40 The first complete English translation was
by Mary Gregor in 1974,41 and there are other translations, of which
I have used the one by Robert B. Louden for comparative purposes.
When Foucault’s translation was published in 1964, it was without
the long introduction, and simply appeared with a short three and
a half page ‘Notice historique’.42 As the title suggests, Foucault is
concerned with the provenance of Kant’s text. With a few minor
exceptions, the ‘Notice historique’ is taken from the initial pages of
his longer introduction. The introduction was only published after
Foucault’s death, although it had long been available to researchers.
Kant lectured on physical geography for forty years, and the lectures
on anthropology developed from this work and then were delivered as
a separate course over three decades. From 1772, geography was the
focus in the summer semester; anthropology in the winter. Towards
the end of his life, Kant edited the anthropology lectures into a book
published in 1798; the geography lectures were compiled by others.43
Foucault says that we ‘know nothing, or virtually nothing, about the
different versions of the text that existed prior to the final draft’. He
indicates that some of the student notes from Kant’s lectures were
published but that they cannot be ‘relied upon’, because ‘it is hard
to have confidence in notes that were published thirty-five years after
Kant’s death’ (IKA 12/18).44 For his editorial work, Foucault used
both the Akademie Ausgabe, as well as the eleven-volume Cassirer
edition of Kant’s works, which he bought in Germany.45 Foucault
translated the second edition of the Anthropologie, published in
1800, which is the version in volume VII of the Akademie Ausgabe
and the basis for other modern translations. The changes between the
Hamburg, Kant 153
first and second editions are relatively minor, and Louden suggests
that Christian Gottfried Schütz probably did the editing. Kant’s hand-
written manuscript of the Anthropologie survives, uniquely among
his published books. It is also not clear that the changes between the
published text and the manuscript were made by Kant.46
The manuscript is in the library of the University of Rostock,
and Foucault indicates issues where the manuscript and published
text differ (IKA 12/18; 16–17/26–7; 22/36; 23/38; 31/49). Foucault
also provides a number of ‘Variantes’ as an appendix to his trans-
lation (APPV–/263–7), which are based on the printed version in
the Akademie Ausgabe. The idea that Foucault consulted the manu-
script itself is intriguing, but it is unlikely he actually did.47 Although
Hamburg and Rostock are only about one hundred miles apart, and
there is today a direct trainline between them, at the time Foucault
did this work Rostock was in the German Democratic Republic,
separated by the Inner German Border, and it is not certain he could
have made that trip. He would have faced considerable travel, accom-
modation and itinerary difficulties, as well as any in accessing the
manuscript itself. Foucault’s remaining notes from this period, some
on Institut Français notepaper, indicate work with various sources,
but not manuscripts.48
Foucault spends most of the ‘Notice historique’ discussing the way
the Anthropologie was based on the 1790–1 course, and the relation
it has to other parts of Kant’s work– the three Critiques of course,
but also the Reflexionen zur Anthropologie and the lecture notes he
used, collected in Volume XV of the Akademie Ausgabe, published
in 1913 (IKA 13–14/20–1; DE#19 I, 289–90).49 He is also focused on
the process of the text’s editing (IKA 15–17/23–7; DE#19 I, 290–2),
and thinks the compilation of the text can be precisely dated to the
‘first half of 1797– perhaps in the first three or four months’ (IKA
17/27; DE#19 I, 292).
In his longer introduction, Foucault speaks of the ‘layers that give
its geology depth’ and ‘the archaeology of the text’, though cautions
both are difficult on the basis of available evidence (IKA 12–13/19).
Foucault also talks of ‘the archaeology of a term’ (IKA 71/112). This
is a theme Kant himself had perhaps hinted at with the notion of
‘an archaeology [Archäologie/archéologie] of nature’ (APPV 193).
Foucault therefore outlines two registers through which the text
should be analysed: genetic and structural. Genetically, the work
needed to be understood in relation to its development, as the text
we have is ‘weighed down with sedimentation, having closed over
the past in which it took shape’ (IKA 12/19). Structurally it needed
to be situated within Kant’s work as a whole, both in terms of its
154 Hamburg, Kant
overall organization, and in relation to the critical work. Later he

calls this relation ‘historical and structural’, a problem ‘apparent
both in the chronology of the texts and in the architectonics of the
œuvre’ (IKA 20/33). This twofold approach obviously related to the
way his rapporteur for this thesis, Hyppolite, had approached Hegel’s
Phenomenology. Indeed, it has been repeatedly suggested that the title
of the introduction was ‘Genèse et structure de l’Anthropologie de
Kant’– a clear tribute to Hyppolite– though the archival copies all
have the simple title ‘Introduction à l’Anthropologie de Kant’.50
Part of the complication of treating this text, for Foucault, comes
from the way the Anthropology relates to the Critiques. The lectures
began before the critical period, they continue through it, and indicate
some of the ways Kant would develop his work beyond the Critiques.
It is impossible for this reason to make a clear distinction between the

genetic perspective and the structural method in the analysis of this
work: we are dealing with a text which, in its very depth, its definite
presence and the balance of its elements, is contemporary with each
phase of the movement that it concludes. Only a genesis of the entire
critical enterprise, or, at least, a reconstruction of the movement of the
whole, could register the finality of the form in which it was achieved
and dissolved. Conversely, if the structure of the anthropologico-critical
relations could be precisely defined, then only this could uncover the
genesis which was to culminate in that final stability– or penultimate,
if it is indeed the case that the Opus Postumum was already making the
first steps on the ground, at last regained, of transcendental philosophy.
(IKA 14–15/22–3)
What we know of the lectures has changed since the time Foucault
wrote his introduction, since all the extant student notes from the
lectures have been edited as volume XXV of the Akademie Ausgabe.51
Translating Kant
There are many interesting things about Foucault’s translation. Some
of his choices are unproblematic, including Tugend as vertu, virtue
(APPV 147, 151, 295, 307), or Lebenskraft as force vitale, vital force
(APPV 167). The complicated term Geschlecht, to which Derrida
would later pay so much attention for its polysemy, is here straight-
forwardly translated as sexe (APPV 303). Dasein, so important in
his translation of Binswanger, is just the simple existence (i.e. APPV
131, 135). Other choices are perhaps products of his time compared
to more modern translations. For instance, he translates Mensch as
Hamburg, Kant 155
homme, man, throughout, not human or human being; and Affekt as

emotion rather than affect (i.e. APPV 121, 235, 251, 252). Foucault
translates Kant’s contrast between guter Willens and böser Wille as
une volonté bonne and une volonté mauvaise, a good and bad will,
rather than good and evil (APPV 205). Nietzsche, of course, made
much of the distinction between good, bad and evil, gut, schlecht and
böse, in the first essay of On the Genealogy of Morality.
Erkennen, Erkenntnis and Erkenntnisvermögen are rendered as
connaître, connaissance and faculté de connaître– know or under-
stand, knowledge and faculty of understanding, rather than cognize,
cognition or cognitive faculty (i.e. APPV 127, 143). With the notion
of Bewußtsein, Foucault translates this as either connaissance,
knowledge, or as conscience, which means both conscience and
consciousness (i.e. APPV 127; 131, 161). The latter choice has at
least two registers, but connaissance also means it is not clear if the
concept being referenced is Bewußtsein or Erkenntnis. When the two
German terms appear in close proximity, Foucault tends to translate
them as conscience and connaissance, respectively (i.e. APPV 141).
More significantly, Gemüt is usually translated as esprit, spirit,
rather than mind (i.e. APPV 151, 161, 252). Gemütskrafte is ren-
dered as forces de l’esprit, when mental powers might have been
more appropriate (APPV 181). Foucault discusses the word Gemüt
in his introduction in some detail, and indeed suggests that it is ‘the
principal element of Kant’s exploration’ (IKA 34/56; see 64/102). But
his choice to render as esprit raises at least two complications.
One is that esprit is also the translation for Geist, the term that is
of course so central to Hegel, and which Foucault had discussed in
his diploma thesis a decade before. When Foucault discusses Gemüt
and Geist in the introduction he keeps the German words (i.e. IKA
37–8/60–1; 39–40/63–4). But the introduction was not included in
the translation, and readers would have not had sight of his discus-
sion. For example, Kant says that ‘Geist ist das belebende Prinzip im
Menschen’; ‘Spirit is the animating principle in the human being.’
Foucault here employs a circumlocution: ‘Le Principe spirituel est en
l’homme le principe qui vivifie’ (APPV 225). Similarly, Foucault has
to resort to a complicated phrasing when Kant directly relates the two
terms. Kant says that ‘Man nennt das durch Ideen belebende Prinzip
des Gemüts Geist.’ Louden renders this as ‘The principle of the mind
that animates by means of ideas is called spirit’, whereas Foucault has
Kant effectively utter a tautology: ‘Le principe qui anime l’esprit par
les idées, c’est le principe spirituel’ (APPV 246). It might seem that
these two passages alone would have indicated the complications of
keeping one French word for two German ones. Additionally, Kant
156 Hamburg, Kant
says that ‘In the French language Geist and Witz bear one name,
Esprit. In German it is different’ (APPV 225). This is important for
three reasons: because Kant suggests esprit is the translation of Geist;
because he recognizes the challenge of working between languages;
and because of the relation Geist and Witz – wit, joke, humour–
have in French but not in German. When Kant does discuss Witz
directly (i.e. APPV 204, 220), Foucault again choses esprit to render
the German word. This means that when esprit appears in the trans
lation, it could mean any of three German terms.
The other difficulty with rendering Gemüt as esprit is more
interesting for Foucault’s wider concerns at the time. Kant uses
Gemütskrankheit and related words such as Gemütstörung and
Gemütsverstimmung for what we would now call mental illness,
derangement or discord. Instead of the term maladie mentale, which
Foucault used in his 1954 book and its 1962 revision, he chooses
to keep the Gemüt–esprit relation, which leads to the odd-sounding
maladie de l’esprit and perturbation de l’esprit (APPV 161, 202, 216)
or maladie de l’âme (APPV 203). In the introduction, Foucault dis-
cusses Gemütsschwäche and Gemütskrankheit, which he renders as
‘déficiences de l’esprit. . . et de ses maladies’, deficiencies and illnesses
of esprit (IKA 18/30). Kant does occasionally use the idea of an illness
of the soul, Seele, which Foucault renders with the equivalent âme
(APPV 161, 216, 286), but he also uses that French word on at least
two occasions to translate Gemüt, the latter of which is concerned
with illness (APPV 139, 251). Seelenforschern, for which the sense is
surely ‘psychologists’, is rendered as investigateurs de l’âme (APPV
142).52 Specific types of illness are translated in various ways. Kant’s
Wahnsinn is translated as délire, delirium or delusion. But Kant pro-
vides the Latin dementia, which is perhaps closer in sense (APPV
215, 217). Verrückung is translated as both aliénation and folie,
alienation or madness, even on the same page (APPV 216, see 217),
and the adjective verrückt as malade, sick or ill (APPV 217). Kant
however makes it clear that he understands Verrückung in the sense
of a progressive break from orders and norms, not just ‘disorder and
deviation’, but ‘another rule, a totally different standpoint’ (APPV
216). Derangement or displacement perhaps captures this better than
aliénation, with its Hegelian and Marxist connotations. Hegel and
Marx use different terms, including Entfremdung and Entäußerung.
Interestingly, Foucault makes the claim that the published text ‘leaves
no room for any kind of psychology whatsoever’, because of its focus
on Gemüt, not Seele (IKA 35/57; see 37/60).
A short passage illustrates some of these choices in context (APPV
202):
Hamburg, Kant 157
Die Fehler des Erkenntnisvermögens sind entweder Gemütsschwächen

oder Gemütskrankheiten. Die Krankheiten der Seele in Ansehung des
Erkenntnisvermögens lassen sich unter zwei Hauptgattungen bringen.
Die eine ist die Grillenkrankheit (Hypochondrie) und die andere das
gestörte Gemüt (Manie).
Les défauts de la faculté de connaître sont ou bien des déficiences ou

bien des maladies de l’esprit. Les maladies de l’âme qui concernant la
faculté de connaître se divisent en deux espèces principales. L’une con-
siste dans des chimères (hypochondries), l’autre dans des perturbations
de l’esprit (manies).
Louden’s translation reads:
The defects of the cognitive faculty are either mental deficiencies or

mental illnesses. Illnesses of the soul with respect to the cognitive
faculty can be brought under two main types. One is melancholia
(hypochondria) and the other is mental derangement (mania).
This does not mean that Gemüt and Geist should have been distin-
guished in every instance, or that each should only be translated by
a single English or French word. Compounds, for example, can use
one word as a root, but be rendered in another language by distinct
terms. For example, Kant uses Geistesgenuß, Geistergeschichten,
Geistesabwesenheit – mental-pleasure, ghost-stories, and absent-
mindedness– which Foucault renders as délectation spirituelle,
histoires d’esprits, and ‘dans l’esprit, un état d’absence’ or ‘être
absent’ (APPV 157, 181, 185, 208). A Geistliche– a priest, minister
or clergyman– is rendered by Foucault as gens or hommes d’Église
or, most often, simply prêtre (APPV 171, 295, 200, 207, 273).
Kant suggests that ‘the demand that reason makes on the cognitive
faculty’ can be summarized ‘in three questions, which are directed to
the three cognitive faculties’:
What do I want? (asks understanding)

What does it matter? (asks the power of judgement)
What comes of it? (asks reason) (APPV 227).
With the first, Kant specifies that ‘“wanting” is understood here in a

purely theoretical sense. What do I want to assert as true?’ (APPV 227
n. 1). Understanding, power of judgement and reason are translations
of the German Verstand, Urteilskraft and Vernunft, which Foucault
renders as entendement, jugement and raison. These are unsurprising
choices, though notably Foucault follows the simple rendering of
158 Hamburg, Kant
Urteilskraft as judgement, as older English translations did, rather

than emphasizing the -kraft suffix– p ower of judgement. This means
that Foucault translates Kant’s Urteilskraft and Urteile both as juge-
ment (i.e. APPV 199). Interestingly, when Kant talks of the Vermögen
der urteilen, here Foucault opts for le pouvoir de juger, the power
rather than the faculty of judging (i.e. APPV 199). He does the same
with Denkungsvermögen as the pouvoir de penser, the power of
thinking (i.e. APPV 161); whereas sinnlichen Dichtungsvermögens
is faculté de l’invention sensible (APPV 174). Foucault also does not
translate the suffix -kraft in Einbildungskraft, which he has just as
imagination, rather than power of imagination (i.e. APPV 153, 167,
241). These decisions seem to be in some tension with his discussion of
these issues in the introduction, where Foucault distinguishes between
Prinzip, Vermögen and Kräfte (IKA 37–8/60–1). Interestingly, to
translate Kant’s Gewalt– p ower, violence or force– Foucault uses
a range of words, including contrôle (APPV 131), puissance (APPV
163, 202), violence (APPV 152, 177, 257), force (APPV 273) and
most often pouvoir (i.e. APPV 144, 158, 216, 236, 253, 274, 330–1).
This semantic breadth indicates Foucault’s crucial later theorization
of power is almost entirely absent from his thinking at this time.
At one point, Kant says that:
This note does not really [eigentlich] belong to anthropology. In anthro-

pology, experiences are appearances [Erscheinungen Erfahrungen]
united according to laws of understanding, and in taking into con-
sideration our way of representing things, the question of how they
are apart from their relation to the senses (consequently as they are
in themselves [mithin an sich selbst]) is not pursued at all; for this
belongs to metaphysics, which has to do with the possibility of a priori
cognition [Erkenntnis]. (APPV 142–3)
Kant here makes a distinction between the work of anthropology and

that of metaphysics. In anthropology, ‘experiences are appearances
[Erscheinungen]’. The latter question, of things in themselves, is the
realm of metaphysics, concerned ‘with the possibility of a priori cog-
nition [Erkenntnis]’ (APPV 142–3). Now, while Kant’s distinction is
important for how Hegel and the phenomenological tradition from
Husserl would work, his terms are quite specific. Foucault reads the
passage as already being phenomenological:
Cette remarque ne relève pas exactement de l’Anthropologie. Dans

celle-ci, les phénomènes unifiés selon les lois de l’entendement sont
des expériences et on ne met pas en question, d’après la forme de
représentation des choses, ce qu’elles sont si on ne prend pas en con-
Hamburg, Kant 159
sidération le rapport aux sens, partant ce qu’elles sont en soi; car

cette recherche est du domaine de la métaphysique, qui a affaire à la
possibilité de la connaissance a priori.
In English, the key passage would read ‘phenomena unified by the

laws of understanding are experiences and are not put in question,
after the form of representation of things, that they are outside of
the consideration of the relation to the senses, of how they are in
themselves [en soi]’. Crucially, Kant’s term Erscheinungen is rendered
as phénomènes rather than appearances. While in some non-technical
instances that might be an appropriate translation, it is philosophically
loaded, and Kant, notably, does not use Phänomen here. Foucault
briefly mentions this issue in his introduction, noting the distinction
between Schein and Erscheinung– illusion and appearance– though
translates neither term (IKA 43/69).53 There is only a brief mention of
Husserl in the introduction (IKA 67–8/107). Elsewhere, Kant suggests
that anthropology is knowledge of the world (APPV 120), which per-
haps provides a link back to Foucault’s earlier interest in the concept
of world in phenomenology and the human sciences.
When Kant turns to political association, some of Foucault’s
choices are intriguing.
Unter dem Wort Volk (populus) versteht man die in einem Landstrich
vereinigte Menge Menschen, insofern sie ein Ganzes ausmacht.
Diejenige Menge oder auch der Teil derselben, welcher sich durch
gemeinschaftliche Abstammung für vereinigt zu einem bürgerlichen
Ganzen erkennt, heißt Nation (gens); der Teil, der sich von diesen
Gesetzen ausnimmt (die wilde Menge in diesem Volk), heißt Pöbel
(vulgus), dessen gesetzwidrige Vereinigung das Rottieren (agere
per turbas) ist, ein Verhalten, welches ihn von der Qualität eines
Staatsbürgers auschließt.
Par le terme de peuple (populus), on entend la masse des hommes

réunis en une contrée, pour autant qu’ils constituent un tout. Cette
masse, ou les éléments de cette masse à qui une origine commune
permet de se reconnaître comme unie en une totalité civile, s’appelle
nation (gens) : la partie qui s’exclut de ces lors (l’élément indiscipline
de ce peuple) s’appelle la plèbe (vulgus) : quand elle se coalise contre
les lois, c’est la révolte (agere perturbas) : conduite qui la déchoit de sa
qualité de citoyen. (APPV 311)
Turning Foucault’s French into English (following Louden except

where terms differ), would look like:
160 Hamburg, Kant
By the word people (populus) is meant a mass of men united in a

country, in so far as they constitute a whole. This mass, or even the
elements of this mass, which through its common origin allows itself
to recognize itself as united in a civil totality, is called a nation (gens):
The part that excludes itself from these laws (the undisciplined element
within this people) are called the plebs (vulgus), whose illegal associ-
ation is the rebellion (agere per turbas): conduct that excludes them
from the quality of a citizen.
Compare this to Louden’s own translation:
By the word people (populus) is meant a multitude of human beings

united in a region, in so far as they constitute a whole. This multitude,
or even the part of it that recognizes itself as united into a civil whole
through common ancestry, is called a nation (gens). The part that
exempts itself from these laws (the unruly crowd within this people)
is called a rabble (vulgus), whose illegal association is the mob (agere
per turbas),– conduct that excludes them from the quality of a citizen.
Kant’s text includes Latin words that are close to what he is suggest-
ing with his German terms, but it is interesting that Foucault does not
follow the most obvious comparisons. Indeed, for Pöbel, vulgus he
chooses a different Latinate term, plèbe, rather than something like
the English rabble, unruly or vulgar. The words opted for here seem
to be a deliberate choice to avoid ones with any Hegelian or Marxist
associations.
Interestingly, Foucault discusses the way that philosophers like Kant
are working with different languages, ‘since the decline of Latin as the
universal scholarly and philosophical language’ (IKA 62/97). Kant
frequently notes Latin terms in a way that is both ‘systematic and
essential’, with Foucault even noting that in the first Critique ‘Kant is
even embarrassed by his German, and considers it a limitation’ (IKA
62/98). However, Foucault contends that while references to Latin
terms are also frequent in the Anthropology ‘they are no longer
essential, having the value only of signposts and points of reference
[d’indication et de repère]’ (IKA 62/98). Here he finds that ‘the real
work, the path taken by the thinking in the Anthropology does not
pass through this Latinity, rather it is directed by the German system
of expression’ (IKA 62/98–9).
When Kant turns to the question of the sublime, he provides
the word ‘sublime’ as a gloss to his German word Das Erhabenz
(APPV 243). Foucault takes this as the French word, and so translates
the German with this word, and adds a note saying: ‘In French in the
text’. But given Kant’s well-known debt to Edmund Burke, it seems
Hamburg, Kant 161
much more likely that Kant means the English word.54 The inter-
play of the languages– its Latinate root, Kant’s German, Foucault’s
French and English come together.
Introducing Kant: Anthropology and the Question of Man

The introduction shares themes with his lectures on philosophical
anthropology from the early 1950s. Indeed, the folder of the course
has his rue Monge address at the foot of the page, along with one in
Hamburg crossed out. This suggests he used it as a resource while
working on the translation and its introduction. Once again Foucault
notes that the three key questions of the transcendental method are
‘What can I know? What should I do? What can I hope for?’ The
additional question ‘What is man?’ or ‘What is the human?’ is crucial
for Foucault.55 He suggests that while it follows from the first three,
it also gathers ‘them together in a single frame of reference, for all
of the questions must come ultimately down to this, as must anthro-
pology, metaphysics, morality, and religion’ (IKA 47/74–5). Foucault
suggests this may be a ‘sign of a rupture’, a rupture, though not a
coupure or break, in Kant’s thinking (IKA 47/75). Indeed, Foucault
sees this question as the key to understanding the purpose of Kant’s
Anthropology (IKA 48/76), but it is not just important for this text.
Foucault sees this enquiry into the man, or human, as taking a crucial
place ‘in the economy of the final stage of Kantian thought, which is
to say in the passage from a critical– hence necessarily propaedeutic
– reflection to the realization of a transcendental philosophy’ (IKA
54/86). This anthropological question is based on the first three ques-
tions, but takes them in a different direction, based on the three
Critiques, developing though the Logic, yet leading in the direction of
the Opus Postumum (IKA 86–7).
The relation between the 1798 text and the Critique is therefore
paradoxical. On the one hand, the Critique announces and makes
space for anthropology at the heart of an empirical philosophy; the
Anthropology, for its part, makes no reference to the Critique or
to the organizing principles that it sets out. On the other hand, the
Anthropology repeats the general articulation of the Critique, as well
as the now traditional division of the faculties, as if it went without
saying that it should do so; and yet, despite this implicit and con-
stant reference to the Critique, the latter has no foundational value
with regard to the Anthropology. The Anthropology rests on the
Critique but is not rooted in it. It inclines spontaneously toward that
which must serve as its foundation: not critical, but transcendental
162 Hamburg, Kant
hilosophy itself. It is there that we discover the structure and the

p
function of its empiricity. (IKA 55/87–8)
As Chapter 5 showed, Foucault was reading Nietzsche through

Heidegger. Yet he was also reading Kant through Heidegger, with
the 1929 book Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics appearing
in French translation in 1953. In that text, which was dedicated
to Scheler,56 Heidegger made the claim that anthropology grounds
Kant’s metaphysical work, through an examination of the ‘subjectiv-
ity of the human subject’. Rather than the then-dominant reading of
the neo-Kantians, which saw the Critique of Pure Reason as primarily
a theory of knowledge, Heidegger explored Kant’s work in relation to
his own main concern, ontology. Heidegger claims that ‘the ground-
ing of metaphysics is a question of the human [ein Fragen nach dem
Menschen], i.e. anthropology’.57 Manfred Kuehn contends that this
is interesting, but not Kant’s own understanding of the work.58 But
it is very close to how Foucault is reading the text. Like Foucault,
Heidegger understands anthropology in its older, literal sense, as a
‘science of man [Menschenkunde]’.59 Heidegger particularly explores
the relation between Kant’s fourth question and to the prior three.
He had used an analytic of Dasein as a mode of access to the more
fundamental question of being in Being and Time, and his reading
of Kant follows a similar logic, in that Kant’s anthropology grounds
his metaphysics. That said, Heidegger felt that readings of his work
as an anthropology were fundamentally flawed, and he questions
the validity of Kant’s move.60 Foucault also questions the relation
between Kant’s critiques and his examination of the human, but
from a more historical perspective rather than a metaphysical one.
Both Foucault and Heidegger share a concern with the question of
finitude. Kant and Heidegger use der Mensch, which modern English
translations tend to render as ‘the human’, but for Foucault, as indeed
for the French translation of Heidegger’s text, this is the question of
‘man’, l’homme.61 The meaning and indeed invention of the human
or man continues to be a major theme of Foucault’s work following
this dialogue.
Heidegger is a silent presence in Foucault’s examination of this
theme, while Nietzsche is a much more explicit reference. Nietzsche
is introduced by Foucault with his mocking description of Kant as
the ‘great Chinaman of Königsberg’, and then through the ideas of
philosophizing with a hammer, of daybreak, and the eternal return:
‘For it is there, in that thinking which thought the end of philosophy,
that the possibility of continuing to philosophize, and the injunction
of a new austerity, resides’ (IKA 68/107–8).62 Indeed, the introduction
Hamburg, Kant 163
ends with Nietzsche. Foucault sees him as having initiated a way of

thinking that would move beyond Kant’s project of the Anthropology
and the crucial question of ‘What is man?’
We can now see why, in a single movement, characteristic of the think-

ing [réflexion] of our time, all knowledge of man is presented as either
dialectized from the start or fully dialecticizable– a s always invested
with a meaning which has to do with the return to the originary, to
the authentic, to the founding activity, to reason why there is a world
of significations. [We can also see now why] all philosophy presents
itself as capable of communicating directly with the sciences of man or
empirical studies [réflexions] of man without having to take a detour
through a critique, an epistemology, or a theory of knowledge [con-
naissance]. Anthropology is the secret path which, orientated towards
the foundations of our knowledge [savoir], connects, in the form of
an unreflective mediation of man’s experience and philosophy. The
values implicit in the question Was ist der Mensch? are responsible
for this homogeneous, de-structured and infinitely reversible field in
which man presents his truth as the soul of truth. The polymorphous
notions of ‘meaning [sens]’, ‘structure’, and ‘genesis’– w hatever value
they might have, and which a rigorous reflection ought to restore
to them– here indicate only the confusion of the domain in which
they assume their communicative roles. That these notions circulate
indiscriminately throughout the human sciences and philosophy does
not justify us in thinking this or that, as if in unison, this or that; it
merely points up our incapacity to undertake a veritable critique of the
anthropological illusion. (IKA 78/123–4)
Foucault suggests that the model for this critique, for ‘bringing that
proliferation of the questioning of man to an end’ can be found in
the ‘Nietzschean enterprise’. The death of God puts an ‘end to the
absolute’, and so it is also the ‘death of man’. Closing his analysis,
Foucault suggests that:
Is it not possible to conceive of a critique of finitude which would be as

liberating with regard to man as it would be with regard to the infinite,
and which would show that finitude is not an end but rather than
camber and knot in time when the end is in fact a beginning?
The trajectory of the question Was ist der Mensch? in the field of
philosophy reaches its end in the response which both challenges and
disarms it: der Übermensch. (IKA 78–9/124)
When Foucault published his Kant translation in 1964, he added a

note not found in the secondary thesis introduction: ‘The relation of
critical thought and anthropological reflection will be studied in a
future work’ (DE#19 I, 293 n. 1). In retrospect, this is a reference to
164 Hamburg, Kant
Les Mots et les choses, published in 1966 and translated as The Order
of Things. Before it took on its final title, Foucault would refer to it
as his ‘book on signs’, which Defert suggests he began working on in
October 1963, not long after completing work on the proofs of the
Kant translation (C 25/19). L’Ordre des choses was Foucault’s own
first preference for the book’s title, and that phrase appears in the
translation as his rendering of Kant’s die Ordnung der Dinge (APPV
162). The Order of Things will be discussed in The Archaeology
of Foucault, but there are indications of that future project even in
Kant’s own text, let alone Foucault’s introduction.
Bezeichnungsvermögen, which Kant glosses with the Latin facultas
signatrix, is translated by Foucault as faculté de désignation, rather
than the faculty of signification or using signs (APPV 191). For Kant,
‘One can divide signs [Zeichen] into arbitrary (artificial [Kunst-]),
natural, and miraculous [Wunderzeichen/prodigieux] signs’ (APPV
192). This leads to Foucault’s claim that of Kant’s terms, Kunst is
‘among the most resistant to translation’.
No art, no technique is meant by it; rather, it refers to the fact accord-

ing to which nothing is ever given without being at the same time
exposed to the dangers of an understanding which both grounds it in
construction and flings it into the arbitrary. (IKA 57/90)
As Kant clarifies: ‘All language is a signification [Bezeichnung/désig-

nation] of thought and, on the other hand, the best way of signifying
thought [Gedankenbezeichnung/désignation de la pensée] is through
language, the greatest instrument for understanding ourselves and
others’ (APPV 192). Signification arguably begins with the sign, and
looks to show what that sign means. Designation, in a sense is the
reverse, beginning with the referent, and looking at what sign is
used to indicate it. This theme is important, and in the introduction,
Foucault suggests that the Anthropology is ‘a reflection on and in a
system of constituted and all-encompassing signs’ (IKA 61/97).
The preface to History of Madness was the last thing to be written.

Signed ‘Hamburg, 5 February 1960’, it says that the book was begun
‘in the Swedish night’ and completed in ‘the stubborn, bright sunlight
of Polish freedom’. In both places, Dumézil is acknowledged for his
support, as someone ‘without whom the work would never have been
undertaken’ (FD1 x; DE#4 I, 167; HM–/xxxv). As Dumézil him-
self notes, ‘this quickly famous book made his career. He no longer
needed help.’63 In the preface, Foucault continues to pay generous
tribute to his masters– but not, notably, to Jacqueline Verdeaux,
Hamburg, Kant 165
who might at least have been indicated as the co-signatory of the

earlier book contract: ‘I must also thank M. Jean Hyppolite, and
above all, M. Georges Canguilhem, who read this work in a still
unformed state, advised me when things were not simple, saved me
from many errors, and showed me the value of being heard’ (FD1 x;
DE#4 I, 167; HM–/xxxv–xxxvi).64 Canguilhem, however, insisted
that this greatly exaggerated his role. He suggested Foucault tone
down some of the more rhetorical passages, but Foucault refused to
change anything. Eribon reports that ‘the thesis was defended and
the work published in the form in which Canguilhem first read it’;65
Macey adds that in Canguilhem’s recollection, ‘the tribute paid him
by Foucault was simply a matter of academic politeness’.66 Foucault
also thanks Mauzi, but closes with an oblique reference to his time
outside France and possibly the Warsaw scandal:
Other names who appear not to matter should also be mentioned. Yet
they know, these friends from Sweden and these Polish friends, that
something of their presence is in these pages. May they forgive me for
making such demands, on them and their happiness, so close to a work
that spoke only of distant sufferings, and the somewhat dusty archives
of pain. (FD1 xi; DE#4 I, 167; HF–/xxxvi)
The reference to the archives is important rather than just metaphor-

ical. Although much of the work was done with printed texts, in
History of Madness he also worked with primary materials that could
give voice to those silenced: ‘Perhaps, to my mind, the most important
part of this work is the space I have left to the texts of the archives
themselves’ (FD1 ix; DE#4 I, 166; HM–/xxxv).
The Kant introduction is inscribed within the ‘Nietzschean enter-
prise’ (IKA 78/124); the preface to the History of Madness suggested
it stood as one enquiry among many ‘under the sun of the great
Nietzschean quest’ (FD1 v; DE#4 I, 162; HM–/xxx). It makes sense
that Foucault presented them together for his doctoral degree.
8
Defence, Publication,
Reception, Revision
As rapporteur for Foucault’s primary thesis, Canguilhem had two

key roles. The first was to write a report on the thesis to support its
printing in advance of its defence. Dated 19 April 1960, Canguilhem
supported Foucault’s thesis enthusiastically. He suggests that its ‘den-
sity vies with its scope’; that its ‘style is incisive’, and that ‘we are truly
in the presence of a thesis, which renews not only the ideas but also
the techniques for understanding and presenting the facts regarding
the history of psychiatry’.1 Canguilhem then outlines the key themes:
The entire history of the beginnings of modern psychiatry prove to be

falsified by an illusion of retroactivity according to which madness was
already given– a lthough unnoticed– in human nature. The truth [le
vrai], according to M. Foucault, is that madness had to be constituted
at first as a form of unreason, held at a distance by reason as a neces-
sary condition for it to come into view as an object of study. 2
Canguilhem goes on to praise the work in the archives alongside more

familiar texts: ‘A professional historian could not help but be sympa-
thetic with the effort made by a young philosopher to access primary
sources.’3 He suggests that, whether Foucault had intended to or not,
his work can be seen as a contribution to ‘the social psychology of
the abnormal’, and that the ‘fruitful dialogue between psychology
and philosophy’ is revived in his work. That might be the key benefit
of his dual training. Concluding, Canguilhem is ‘convinced of the
importance’ of the work, and that it should be printed and defended.4
With permission to publish, Foucault still had to find a publisher.
Defence, Publication, Reception, Revision 167
He initially approached Gallimard, but the manuscript was rejected,

despite supporters within the press’s readers’ committee including
Roger Caillois, and possibly Blanchot. Foucault was offered a place in
Jean Delay’s series at PUF, but he turned this down, instead approach-
ing Plon because of advice from various friends, and because they
had recently published Lévi-Strauss’s Anthropologie structurale, also
rejected by Gallimard.5 Foucault recalls that he did not hear anything
for some time, and it was only when he went to retrieve the manuscript
they informed him they would first have to find it. But when they did,
they gave it to Philippe Ariès (DE#348 IV, 649). Ariès was not an
academic, and was disparaged by professional historians as a ‘banana
importer’, when he was actually a manager of ‘a documentation
centre on third world agriculture’ (DE#348 IV, 650). Ariès was, in
his own words, a ‘Sunday historian’.6 Something similar would haunt
Foucault’s reception by traditional French historians. Nonetheless,
Ariès’s L’Enfant et la vie familiale sous l’ancien régime had been seen
as a revolutionary study, which had appeared with Plon in 1960.7
Ariès recalls: ‘One fine day, a large manuscript arrived: a philos-
ophy thesis on the relations between madness and unreason in the
classical age, by an author unknown to me. . . Reading it, I was
dazzled.’8 Folie et déraison would appear in the series Ariès led,
Civilisations d’hier et d’aujourd’hui.9 The contract was signed on 24
November 1960, and a few copies were printed in advance of the
thesis defence, which are extremely difficult to find. This had a plain
cover, giving the details of the submission, with an inside title page
noting that Canguilhem was the director of studies. The text is the
same as the main version, though it does not have the advertising
details of related books in the endpapers.10 2,700 copies were then
printed after the defence, with a small reprint run of 1,200 copies
in February 1964.11 The only difference between the 1961 and 1964
Plon editions is the date. However, September 1964 also saw the
publication of a heavily abridged version.
Canguilhem’s second role was to serve on the thesis jury. Many
of the teachers from the earliest part of Foucault’s story would take
a role here. Gouhier was chair; Hyppolite and Canguilhem were
there as rapporteurs of the minor and major theses respectively.
Gouhier had been the supervisor of Foucault’s aborted thesis at the
Fondation Thiers almost a decade before. The other places were
taken by Lagache, because of his expertise in psychology and psy-
chiatry, and de Gandillac. De Gandillac had worked on the Middle
Ages and was editor and translator of several primary texts from
that period, including by Dionysius the Areopagite, Nicolas of Cusa,
Peter Abelard and Dante. He would go on to be the French translator
168 Defence, Publication, Reception, Revision
of Walter’s Benjamin’s essay ‘On the Work of Art in the Age of

Mechanical Reproduction’, as well as works by Hegel, Nietzsche,
Ernst Bloch and others.
The defence was on 20 May 1961, over a year after Canguilhem’s
report, and fifteen months since Foucault wrote the final lines of its
preface. It was held at the Sorbonne, in the Salle Louis Liard. It was
an open event and was well attended by almost a hundred people,
from members of the public to academics, students and Foucault’s
friends. Defert– w ho had met Foucault for the first time the year
before– B arthes, Macherey and Jean-Paul Aron were among the
audience.12 The discussion began with the secondary thesis. Foucault
presented the jury with a typescript of the introduction and trans-
lation, not a published version of the text, as was the case with the
thesis on madness.13 At the beginning of the defence, Foucault had
to give a short speech. His notes for this task are archived in Paris,
though they are quite cursory and will be supplemented by the reports
from those who were there.
In his presentation Foucault outlines some of the themes of his
introduction. He suggests the Anthropology needed to be situated in
relation to its own genesis from lectures, the Critiques, its relation
to the Lectures on Logic, and the late texts of the Opus Postumum.
Foucault indicates the importance of Heidegger for a philosophical
reading of the Logic.14 There is a shift, Foucault suggests, in these
sources, from anthropological knowledge in itself in the lectures and
Critiques, to the question of ‘What is the human?’ in the Logic and
Opus Postumum.15 Foucault cautions that the sources for under-
standing the text’s genesis are thin, pointing again to the Reflexionen,
the Collegentwürfe and other parts of the Nachlaß. The traces of
themes from the lectures in relation to Kant’s published writings are
limited, but Foucault outlined some of the main sources.16 Paying
deliberate tribute to Hyppolite, Foucault suggested that Kant’s text
needed to be read through a ‘hybrid structural and genetic analysis’.17
His notes for the opening speech on Folie et déraison are also
preserved. He begins with a display of false modesty, which is none-
theless revealing for seeing the direct relation to the project for La
Table Ronde:
This text is both project and residue of a text which was not written.
The book of an absent book.
I had been asked to write a little history of psychiatry. Something
like Ackerknecht. I apologized for my incompetence, and I proposed,
a little riskily, writing a book more on the mad than on their doctors,
closer to madness at the moment when it is denounced.18
Such a project, though, was made more challenging because these

voices had been silenced by medical discourse. He continues through
some of the book’s themes, and pays tribute to Canguilhem’s role in
allowing him to take this risk.19 There is a cryptic mention of the role
of Nietzsche in a comment on the back of one of the pages.20 Foucault
then suggests that this book is a kind of third study, midway between
a history of psychiatry and a history of madness itself: it is a book
looking at ‘the genesis of the relation that modern man establishes
from himself to himself and which makes all psychology possible’.21
This question of subjectivity is, of course, one which would occupy
Foucault for the rest of his career. He suggested that he wanted to
write the history of the opposition to the ‘absolute powers of madness
in man’.22 In an unscripted remark, he apparently closed with the
comment: ‘To speak of madness, one must have the talent of a poet.’
Canguilhem replied: ‘You have it, monsieur!’23
When it came to the discussion, objections were raised about the
reading of the history of medicine and psychiatry by Lagache, though
Eribon notes that these were often on points of detail, rather than
the overarching thesis. This is perhaps especially strange, given that
Foucault’s work was a challenge to the entire self-understanding
of the discipline of psychiatry, of which Lagache was a pre-eminent
member.24 Canguilhem’s report from a year before had clearly noted
this theme.25 Gouhier was the most critical. He questioned the reading
of Descartes and Diderot, the sense of the notion of the ‘absence of
œuvre’, raised multiple points concerning painting, literature and
scripture, and asked whether Foucault was right to draw on the
experiences of madness in artists and poets.26 As Foucault notes in
an interview later that year, one of the jury’s objections was that he
had tried to ‘do a remake of [Erasmus’s] In Praise of Folly’ (DE#5 I,
169; FL 9).
Despite the criticisms, the examiners were convinced of the worth
of Foucault’s work. Some of the disagreements were part of the ritual
of the defence rather than formal objections. There was certainly a
ceremony to the event, as Jean-Paul Aron recalls:
Canguilhem experienced, this very afternoon, one of the highlights of

an illustrious career. He welcomed Foucault to the Sorbonne, as in the
old academic process, as Dante in majesty did Virgil at Parnassus, or,
as in the blue library of Troy, with the melancholy delight of an old
baron knighting an intrepid chivalrous gentleman.27
But other objections suggest lines of criticism which would be made

about the work as it reached a wider audience in book form. The jury
made their decision and Gouhier told the room that Foucault had
been awarded his degree of doctorat ès lettres ‘with highest honours
[la mention très honorable]’.
Gouhier’s written report on the decision was completed on the 25
May.28 The report is interesting, because despite its high praise for the
work, it notes some serious reservations. Concerning the secondary
thesis, the jury felt that the translation of Kant was ‘correct but a little
hasty’ (SP 98).29 Despite the criticism that Foucault was ‘more of a
philosopher than an exegete or an historian’, Gandillac thought the
translation should be revised and expanded to produce a ‘truly criti-
cal edition of Kant’s text’, with the introduction a separate study (SP
99). In any case, Hyppolite thought the introduction was more of an
outline of a different book on anthropology, suggesting that it ‘owed
much more to Nietzsche than to Kant’ (SP 99).30 Seeing the lineage of
this work back to the Lille and ENS lectures of the early to mid 1950s
thus comes full circle. It not only had its beginning in that interest;
his examiners discerned that it retained that wider project within it.
The Kant translation was really only a ‘pretext’ to that work. Indeed,
Defert recalls that Foucault described the introduction later as ‘his
book on Nietzsche’ (CH 40). The advice to publish a critical edition
of Kant was only partly fulfilled with the 1964 publication.
With the primary thesis, the examiners felt that he has a tendency
towards rhetoric and making an impression, though the ‘erudition is
not in doubt’ (SP 100), and Gouhier notes in his report that ‘apparent
here and there is a certain indifference to the drudgery that always
accompanies the most elevated work’ (SP 98). Foucault was deemed
to have ‘a spontaneous tendency to go beyond the facts themselves’
and the criticisms might have been broader if there had been other
historians on the jury, analysing his work on art, literature and insti-
tutions (SP 100–1). But, despite the ‘serious criticisms’ of both theses,
Gouhier concludes:
However, the fact remains that we are in the presence of a truly original
principal thesis, of a man whose personality, intellectual ‘dynamism’
and talent for exposition qualify him to teach in higher education. This
is why, despite reservations, the distinction was awarded unanimously.
(SP 101)
In addition, each year twenty-four bronze medals were given by the

Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique for the best theses, one
for each discipline. Foucault was awarded the one in philosophy.31
Reception
Foucault had little time to reflect on these accolades. Canguilhem
apparently told him right after the thesis defence: ‘Now it’s time for
you to get to work.’32 One immediate consequence of the award was
Foucault’s appointment as an examiner for the ENS entrance con-
cours, of which Hyppolite was now director (C 24/26).33 But Foucault
also had another job. Between submission and defence, Foucault had
moved from his position in Hamburg. In April 1960 Foucault had
been getting references from Hyppolite and Canguilhem.34
Canguilhem recommended Foucault to Vuillemin, who appointed
him to Clermont-Ferrand as a maître de conférences in psychology,
somewhere between an assistant and associate professor position.35
This was the highest position he could be appointed to without his
doctorate, though it was dependent on History of Madness being pub-
lished. Georges Bastide wrote the report on Foucault’s qualifications
for the post in June 1960: ‘Michel Foucault has already written some
minor works: translations of some German works, and on history
and method in psychology, works of popularization [vulgarization].
All that is respectable. But it is certain that it is the candidate’s theses
that are his best qualifications.’36
Foucault would later refer to his five years abroad as ones where
he was always a stranger (DE#141 II, 660–1). He began his post at
Clermont-Ferrand in October 1960, though again commuted from
Paris, because of a wish to live in the city and access its libraries.
On returning from Hamburg he moved back into the flat on the rue
Monge, before buying his own apartment at 13 rue du Docteur Finlay
in July 1961 (C 23–4/26–7). In the autumn of 1962, with the doctor-
ate now approved, he was promoted to Professor in Philosophy and
head of department, succeeding Vuillemin who had been appointed
to the Collège de France in the chair left vacant by Merleau-Ponty’s
death on 3 May 1961.37 Vuillemin would, almost a decade later, be
one of the key figures behind Foucault’s own election to the Collège.38
It did not take long before Foucault’s book was noticed. Some of
this was due to copies he had sent out himself. One was dedicated:
‘For Althusser, who was and remains the master, the first, in witness
of recognition and admiration.’39 Althusser’s reading, along with
that of Jacques Derrida, will be discussed in The Archaeology of
Foucault. Perhaps most gratifying was Bachelard’s letter on 1 August
1961, saying it was ‘a great book. . . You are a real explorer.’40 This
recognition perhaps makes his 1978 complaint a little unreasona-
ble, describing the book as ‘obviously a bastard: a little history of
sciences, but not the truly beautiful history of sciences– t he history of

mathematics or of theoretical physics, or the history of Galileo– [ but]
the history of a false science’.41
On 22 July 1961 he was interviewed by Jean-Paul Weber in Le
Monde (DE#5 I, 167–9; FL 7–9). To receive such a prominent posi-
tion in this leading newspaper was unusual for a first major work.
In September 1961 Jean Grenier discussed it on Radio-France III in
Heure de culture française.42 On 16 December Foucault took part in a
bad-tempered discussion of madness with the neuropsychiatrist Henri
Baruk on a radio show presented by Serge Jouhet on RTF.43 There
were reviews too, led by Henri Amer in La Nouvelle Revue française,
Barthes in Critique, Octave Mannoni in Les Temps modernes, Robert
Mandrou in Annales (with a brief addendum by Fernand Braudel)
and Serres in Mercure de France. Amer’s review was quite critical,
and Blanchot replied in an article in the next issue.44 Lacroix wrote
a piece in Le Monde on 8 December 1961;45 and the book was also
discussed in a front-page anonymous review in The Times Literary
Supplement.46 Foucault’s 1978 recollection that journals like ‘Les
Temps modernes and Esprit’ were among those that showed ‘no
interest whatsoever’ in the book is therefore simply wrong.47
In the Le Monde interview Foucault briefly recalls his training,
mentioning only his philosophy education and the work with Delay.
But there is already a little rewriting of the past. He stresses that
he ‘did not practise psychiatry’, and when he mentions Duhamel’s
commission for a book on the ‘history of psychiatry’, he suggests that
he immediately repurposed it into a history of madness. Verdeaux’s
involvement is not mentioned at all. Nor is there any mention of
Maladie mentale et personnalité, and the work on Binswanger is
only referenced in Weber’s introduction.48 When it comes to influ-
ences, Foucault suggests literary work like Roussel and Blanchot, and
accepts that Lacan’s work is significant (DE#5 I, 167–8; FL 7–8). But,
of his mentors, the name he singles out is Dumézil. Weber is puzzled:
‘Dumézil? How could an historian of religions inspire work on the
history of madness?’ Foucault’s reply is revealing for another aspect
of language he would later refuse: ‘Through his idea of structure. Just
as Dumézil does with myths, I attempted to discover the structured
forms of experience whose pattern can be found, again and again,
with modifications, at different levels’ (DE#5 I, 168; FL 8).
Clarifying the sense of structure he found, he says it concerns
both exclusion and segregation, agreeing with the interviewer that
it is in part a ‘history of confinement’, but also that he found a
way to examine how that experience of exclusion related to science
and rationalism. Between Racine’s Andromaque and the seventeenth-
century incarceration of a mad person, there is, he argues, not a

‘unity, but structural coherence’ (DE#5 I, 168–9; FL 8). This does
not mean that Dumézil was a structuralist, something that he, like
Foucault later, would strenuously deny.49 But it does perhaps help to
make sense of what Foucault meant when he used that language. One
striking example is in the 1961 preface:
Doing the history of madness will therefore mean making a structural

study of the historical ensemble– n otions, institutions, judicial and
police measures, scientific concepts– which hold captive a madness
whose wild state can never be reconstituted in itself; but in the absence
of that inaccessible primitive purity, the structural study must return
to that decision that both bound and separated reason and madness;
it must tend to discover the perpetual exchange, the obscure common
root, the originary confrontation that gives meaning to the unity and
the opposition of sense and senselessness [du sens et de l’insensé]. This
will allow that lightning flash decision to appear once more, hetero-
geneous with the time of history, but ungraspable outside it, which
separates the murmur of dark insects from the language of reason
and the promise of time. (FD1 vii; DE#4 I, 164; HM–/xxxiii; see HM
446–25–6)
Eribon is clear: ‘Dumézil’s œuvre is one of the fundamental theoreti-

cal sources of inspiration for Foucault’.50 This is a topic that requires
further investigation, but one further indication is perhaps helpful.
Dumézil suggests that the study of Indo-European civilization should
extend to all its ‘remains [vestiges]’. Material remains may be limited,
but ‘there is abundant documentation in words, myths, institutions,
and so on’. He therefore suggests that: ‘We are therefore obliged to
develop, alongside an archaeology of objects and sites, an archae-
ology of representations and behaviours.’51 That description aptly
characterizes much of what Foucault would do in the next decade.
Rewriting the Past

Before the end of 1961, Foucault worked on his next two books. A
first draft of Birth of the Clinic was largely finished over the summer
and completed on 27 November 1961; Raymond Roussel, known
in English as Death and the Labyrinth, was apparently begun on
Christmas Day.52 Defert says that this was not unusual: ‘Christmas
Day without writing, that was impossible! Foucault rarely put dates
on his writings, but he would have been quite capable of putting
“December 25th” on something’ (FMT 216/215; 237 n. 1/215 n. 2).
Indeed, as Defert indicates, Foucault believed this was a day when

‘almost nothing has happened for thousands of years’ (DE#154 II,
731).53 Birth of the Clinic was revised over the next year and appeared
in the Galien series with Presses Universitaires de France edited by
Canguilhem in 1963. Canguilhem denied that he commissioned the
book; recalling rather that Foucault presented an already finished
text.54 It is striking that both books have their roots back to the 1950s.
Foucault described Birth of the Clinic as the ‘out-takes [chutes]’
from History of Madness (C 24/27), and it also used the Bibliotheca
Walleriana. Raymond Roussel was the outcome of Foucault’s ‘secret
affair’ with his writing, where ‘he was my love for several summers’
(DE#343 IV, 608; DL–/187). Crucially, given his later career, this was
the first of his books to be published by Gallimard. The two books
appeared almost simultaneously, in April and early May 1963, with
Foucault delaying publication and negotiating with the publishers to
achieve this.55
Birth of the Clinic and Raymond Roussel take the story beyond the
account offered here. They will be discussed, along with The Order
of Things and The Archaeology of Knowledge, in the final part of my
intellectual history of Foucault’s work. But two works that appeared
after 1961 are significant in the story being told here. The first is the
re-edition of his 1954 book as Maladie mentale et psychologie in
1962, and the second is the heavily abridged edition of Histoire de la
folie in 1964.
Maladie mentale et psychologie

By the early 1960s Maladie mentale et personnalité was out of print,
and presumably wanting to capitalize on the interest in its author
following the publication of Histoire de la folie, PUF decided to do
a new edition. Foucault tried to prevent this, but his contract with
the press gave them the right to go against his wishes.56 Instead, a
compromise was reached, perhaps because Birth of the Clinic was
about to appear with the same press. The 1954 book would be reis-
sued, but as a revised edition to allow Foucault a chance to address
some of what now appeared to him to be its problems, with the
new title Maladie mentale et psychologie. The changes to the text
comprised small amendments to the first half, and a largely rewritten
second part.57 Foucault kept the introduction to the second part from
the 1954 text, making only small changes to its opening paragraph.
He then wrote an entirely new chapter summarizing the History of
Madness as the new Chapter V. Chapter VI begins with about five
new pages, and then used the second half of the original book’s
Chapter V as its second part, with revisions. Chapter VI of the origi-
nal book on Pavlov and reflex psychology was dropped entirely, and
a wholly new conclusion completes the revised edition. Yet none of
this is made apparent to the reader. The copyright page of the second
edition does list a first, but does not indicate its original title; it is
dated to first quarter 1962, but does not say it is revised.58 Subsequent
editions of the book, in 1966 and then several in the Quadrige series
after Foucault’s death, mention the first edition of 1954, but do not
indicate that the text is substantially different. Similarly, the back
cover of the 1962 edition, which, like the earlier edition, has a list of
books in the ‘Initiation Philosophique’ series, now lists Maladie men-
tale et psychologie in the sequence, with its new title, but in the place
of the 1954 book. In the third edition of 1966 the series list appears
in the endpapers. Once reprinted in the Quadrige series, from 1995,
that initial series connection disappears. The English translation is of
the second edition.
One example of the revisions in the first part comes right at the
beginning of the book. In the original, as Chapter 3 discussed,
Foucault suggests that to understand ‘the root of mental pathology’
we should not look at metapathology, ‘but only in a reflexion on man
himself’ (MMPe 2). Now, he revises this to suggest that it should be
sought ‘in a certain relation, historically situated, of man to the mad
man and to the true man’ (MMPs 2/2). And then, while in the original
Foucault had proposed to ‘to recall how the traditional or more recent
psychopathologies were constituted and to indicate which postulates
of mental medicine need to be liberated to become rigorously scien-
tific’ (MMPe 2), in the revised version he replaces the second half of
the phrase with ‘the requirements [préalables] that mental medicine
must be aware of it to acquire new rigour’ (MMPs 2/2). The notion
of scientific rigour is amended, given Foucault’s doubts about science,
and postulates become préalables.
Towards the end of the introduction ‘the morbid individual [l’indi-
vidu morbide]’ (MMPe 16) becomes ‘the individual patient [l’individu
malade]’ (MMPs 16/13). Equally in the critique of a metapathology
(MMPe 16), Foucault now glosses its being ‘artificial [factice]’ as
depending on ‘an historical fact that is already behind us’ (MMPs
16/13). The idea of the ‘real man’ found in the original disappears.
While the 1954 text had proposed one way to examine mental illness
was to ‘look for the concrete forms it can take in the psychological life
of an individual; then determine the conditions that make their vari-
ous aspects possible, and restore the whole causal system that founds
them’ (MMPe 16–17); the 1962 text says ‘look for the concrete
forms that psychology has been able to attribute to it, then determine
the conditions that have made possible this strange status of mad-
ness, a mental illness that cannot be reduced to any illness’ (MMPs
16–17/13). The changes indicated here lead Foucault to reflect his
different approach with an outline of the book’s two parts. The first
remains the same, but the ‘The Real Conditions of the Illness’ (MMPe
17) is replaced:
I. The Psychological Dimensions of Mental Illness

II. Psychopathology as a Fact of Civilization (MMPs 17/13)59
Yet this rewriting did not obscure all traces of language, which
Foucault, in 1972, would fairly systematically remove from the
second edition of Birth of the Clinic.60 He keeps, for example, his
attempt at proposing a ‘structural description of mental illness’. This,
he says, ‘would have to analyse the positive and negative signs for
each syndrome, that is to say, detail the suppressed structures and the
disengaged structures. This would not involve explaining patholog-
ical structures, but simply placing them in a perspective that would
make the facts of individual or social regression observed by Freud
and Janet coherent and comprehensible’ (MMPe 32; MMPs 32/26).61
Right at the end of the first half of the book, in the original, Foucault
says that we need to think about the world and its ‘enigmatic subjec-
tivity’ (MMPe 69). In the revision he says it is its ‘enigmatic status’
that is in question. But he also adds that we need to question the way
in which mental illness ‘is circumscribed as an illness’ (MMPs 69/56).
This replaces a few lines of the original on the need to shift from an
exploration of internal dimensions to the external ones (MMPe 69).
While the changes to the first half are relatively minor, the second
half is more comprehensively reworked. Some of these changes are
still small, such as the removal of references to notions of the person-
ality dependent on the original book’s overall project in 1954 (MMPe
71; MMPs 71/60). But others are much more significant, including the
all-new Chapter V, entitled ‘The Historical Constitution of Mental
Illness’. It begins with the stark statement that ‘it was at a relatively
recent date that the West accorded madness the status of mental
illness’ (MMPs 76/64). He outlines a conventional view that the mad
people of the Middle Ages and Renaissance were possessed, mentally
ill without recognition, and that modern medicine, with its ‘calm,
objective, scientific gaze [regard]’ was able to recognize ‘supernatural
perversion’ as instead ‘a deterioration of nature’ (MMPs 76/64). But
Foucault rejects this story for a number of reasons, suggesting that the
‘complex problem of possession’ is really part of ‘the history of reli-
gious ideas’, not of madness; and that in any case not all mad people
were seen in that way. Indeed, it makes an unwarranted assumption
that the possessed were indeed mentally ill. But Foucault also quickly
outlines how medicine was involved in the treatment of possession,
giving a few examples, and noting how these are distinct histories
which would need to be addressed in detail– something he does, of
course, in part, in the History of Madness (MMPs 76–7/64–5).
Indeed, he suggests that even Greek medicine thought about the
relation of madness to pathology and many hospitals had beds
reserved for the mad. But this does not mean that madness itself was
understood medically: ‘Madness was wide in extension, and it had
no medical base [support]’ (MMPs 78/66). By extension Foucault is
making a crucial point. What was defined as madness was dependent
on many factors, and it changed over time. At different times it was
bound up with understanding of language, of death and fear, art and
literature (MMPs 78–80/66–7). In summary, Foucault contends that
‘up to about 1650, Western culture was strangely hospitable to these
forms of experience’ (MMPs 80/67), but then he immediately follows
this with the break he had identified in History of Madness: ‘About
the middle of the seventeenth century, a sudden change took place:
the world of madness was to become the world of exclusion’ (MMPs
80/67).
Foucault quickly outlines the examples he had explored in such
detail in ‘The Great Confinement’ chapter of History of Madness,
talking of the types of people excluded and the places in which this
happened (MMPs 80–1/67–8). As he notes, ‘These houses had no
medical vocation; one was not admitted in order to receive treatment;
one was taken in because one could no longer cope with life or
because one was no longer fit to belong to society’ (MMPs 81/68).
The question at stake was not the one between ‘madness and illness’,
but the relation society had to itself (MMPs 81/68). In large part the
mad were confined because they were unproductive, ‘their inability to
participate in the production, circulation, or accumulation of wealth’
(MMPs 81/68). ‘Internment, therefore, was linked, in its original and
in its fundamental meaning, with this restructuring of social space’
(MMPs 81–2/68). The other types of people with whom the mad
were interned– the venereally diseased, libertines and criminals– led
to all kinds of alliances of people and the question of ‘moral and
social guilt’ (MMPs 82/69). At the same time, madness was itself
obscured, silenced, ‘deprived of its language’, and was something
spoken of, not spoken by. Only with Freud, Foucault suggests, was
it possible ‘for reason and unreason to communicate in the danger
of a common language’ (MMPs 82/69). As Foucault summarizes:
‘Madness is much more historical than is usually believed, and much

younger too’ (MMPs 82/69).
This internment lasted for about a century, because internment,
especially around the time of the French Revolution, was itself chal-
lenged. But the mad presented a special problem, especially through a
perception of the question of their danger to others. Foucault stresses
that the history books tend to look at Pinel, Tuke and others as
figures of ‘a humanism and that of a finally positive science’ (MMPs
84/70). But as he makes clear, these figures ‘did not relax the old
practices of internment; on the contrary, they tightened them around
the mad’ (MMPs 84/70). Foucault then outlines his account of the
removal of overt physical constraints but the introduction of all kinds
of other measures, especially moral and behavioural, to control the
patient. In all this, medicine plays a crucial though neglected part.
Throughout the classical age, the mad still spent time in hospitals, dif-
ferent treatments were attempted, which were ‘neither psychological
nor physical: they were both at once’. The doctor had a crucial role:
‘Within the asylum, he was the agent of a moral synthesis’ (MMPs
85/71). Pinel is singled out for the moral punishments where he used
some of these medical techniques, though Foucault recognizes it was
more widespread (MMPs 85–6/72).
In an especially crucial passage, Foucault indicates that madness
was understood in a new way. Instead of being something that
affected the body and the soul, it was increasingly inscribed within
a moral set of rules, affecting the ‘human soul, its guilt, and its
freedom’, which led it to being seen as an internal factor, from which
understanding ‘madness was to received psychological status, struc-
ture and signification’ (MMPs 86/72). Yet Foucault rejects the idea
that it was fundamentally about this shift to the psychological. Rather
it was the moral determination and the punishment which goes along-
side it which was crucial, and the psychology ‘merely the superficial
consequence’ (MMPs 86–7/72). Indeed, echoing Nietzsche, and antic-
ipating a theme from a later part of his career, Foucault suggests that
‘one might say that all knowledge is linked to the essential form of
cruelty. The knowledge of madness is no exception’ (MMPs 87/73).
Work in psychology needs to recognize this, and that modern forms
which it takes, be it ‘“objective”, “positive” or “scientific”’, all ‘found
its historical origin and its basis in pathological experience’ (MMPs
87/73). The human becomes a ‘psychologizable species’ through this
move, ‘when its relation to madness was defined by the external
dimension of exclusion and punishment and by the internal dimen-
sion of moral assignation and guilt’ (MMPs 88/73).
As a result, a psychology of madness cannot but be derisory, and yet

it touches the essential. It is derisory because, in wishing to carry out
a psychology of madness, one is demanding that psychology should
undermine its own conditions, that is should turn back to that which
made it possible, and that it should circumvent what is for it, by
definition, the unsurpassable [indépassable]. Psychology can never tell
the truth about madness because it is madness that holds the truth of
psychology. (MMPs 88/74)
Following this line of thought, Foucault claims, would lead to an

unravelling not of the mystery of mental illness, but the ‘destruction of
psychology itself’, and a recognition of ‘the essential, non-psychological
because non-moralizable relation between reason and unreason’
(MMPs 89/74). Invoking the literary figures of Hölderlin, Nerval,
Roussel and Artaud, he sees that relation appearing, and holding out
the possibility that one day humans ‘will be able to be free of all psy-
chology and be ready for the great tragic confrontation with madness’
(MMPs 89/75; see 90/76).
Having now, in just fourteen pages, given a stunning summary of
History of Madness, and shown his readers just how far he had come
in the eight years since the first edition, you might expect Foucault to
end. He had essentially unravelled all the claims made in the preceding
four chapters. But, instead, Foucault provides a final chapter, which,
while new in design, reuses some of the material from the 1954 book.
It begins with about five pages of new text, and then takes material
from the original book’s Chapter V. The new material is interesting
for a number of reasons.
Foucault wants to qualify his previous chapter immediately, saying
it was not intended to pre-empt ‘any attempt to circumscribe the
phenomena of madness or to define a tactic of care’, but rather that
it was impossible for psychology to ‘treat the whole of madness, the
essence and nature of madness’. It is the term ‘mental illness’ that is
his particular target, suggesting that it is ‘simply alienated madness,
alienated in the psychology that it has itself made possible’ (MMPs
90/76). Just as he had at the end of the previous chapter, in invoking
literary and philosophical figures, Foucault now suggests Hieronymus
Bosch’s painting The Garden of Earthly Delights ‘is not the symbolic,
concerted image of madness, nor the spontaneous projection of a
delirious imagination; it is the perception of a world sufficiently near
and far from self to be open to the absolute difference of the insane
(MMPs 91–2/77).
Some of the claims which Foucault makes here rely on the more
substantial analysis in the History of Madness, such as the contrast
between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and others hint at

cultural comparisons to Indonesia, Japan and Arabic medicine for
which he provides scant evidence (MMPs 92–4/78–9). Nonetheless,
his key claim of a divide in knowledge and treatment is insisted upon
here: ‘When the doctor thinks they are diagnosing madness as a phe-
nomenon of nature, it is the existence of this threshold that enables
such a judgement’ (MMPs 93/78). And he hints at the need for a still
more systematic study that brings together discourses and what he
would later call power relations:
The theoretical organization of mental illness is bound up with a

whole system of practices: the organization of the medical network,
the system of detection and prophylaxis, the type of assistance, the
distribution of treatment, the criteria of cure, the definition of the
patient’s civil incapacity and penal irresponsibility: in short a whole set
of practices that defines the concrete life of the mad in a given society.
(MMPs 94/79–80)
In the late 1970s Foucault would introduce the notion of a dispositif

to capture just such an ensemble. But this is still 1962, and he does
not use that vocabulary or set of analyses. Here, he returns to the
discursive, and it is at this point in his revised text that he inserts the
second half of the original book’s Chapter V.
However, the changes to the book require him to amend this too.
Chapter V of the original book, as Chapter 3 above discussed, brings
in the theme of alienation and recasts the analysis of evolution, indi-
vidual history and existence within a social analysis. It shows how
they took a symptom for the essence, the origin of the pathological.
As part of the more Marxist tone of that 1954 book, Foucault had
outlined the context for understanding mental illness. He says: ‘The
social relations that determine the contemporary economy, in forms
of competition, exploitation, imperialist wars, class struggle, give
man an experience of the human milieu which is continually haunted
by contradiction’ (MMPe 86). This passage is used in the revision, but
‘the contemporary economy’ is replaced by ‘a culture’, and ‘imperial-
ist wars’ by ‘group rivalry’ (MMPs 98/82). Equally, while in 1954 he
had spoken of ‘exploitation, which alienates from an economic object’
and ‘social laws’ (MMPe 86) now he broadens this to ‘the system of
economic relations’ and ‘laws of coexistence’ (MMPs 98/82). There
are also a couple of times when Foucault changes société to culture,
and social to culturel (see MMPe 84–5; MMPs 96–7/81). Explicitly
removing Marxist terms, Foucault replaces ‘the Hegelian theme’
with ‘the old theme’, ‘bourgeois’ with ‘European’ and ‘capitalism’
with ‘our culture’ (MMPe 87; MMPs 99/83). In 1954 Foucault had
suggested that regarding the contradictions of existence in culture:
‘psychologists have given this experience the name of ambivalence
and seen in it the conflict of instincts. Its origin is, in reality, in the
contradiction of social relations’ (MMPe 87). In 1962 the second
sentence is replaced with ‘A mythology built on so many dead myths’
(MMPs 99/83).
One key passage is the final paragraph of Chapter VI, which reuses
material from 1954 but with some interesting differences (MMPe
89–90; MMPs 101/84–5). First, Foucault replaces ‘evolution’ with
‘genesis’, but more importantly, the idea of ‘real origins’ with ‘onto-
logical forms’. Additionally, the idea that only history can provide us
with sufficient access also changes. In 1954, it is ‘the conditions of
possibility of psychological structures’, in 1962 it is ‘the sole concrete
a priori from which mental illness draws, with the empty opening up
of its possibility, its necessary figures’. A schematic overview of the
book’s argument in 1954 (MMPe 90) is dropped entirely in 1962. So
too is the entire Chapter VI of the original book. This was the chapter
in which Pavlov, and Marxist work more generally, was seen as a
resolution to some of the questions raised in earlier parts. His distance
from the party may explain this cut, as does his own intellectual devel-
opment. But another factor may have been Canguilhem’s study of the
reflex, which appeared in 1955 and fundamentally changed the terms
of the debate between external stimulus and physiological response.62
The timeline, alone of the second half of the book, is entirely
unchanged from the 1954 edition. The 1962 book has an entirely
new, and much briefer conclusion. In it, Foucault makes the claim
that the relation between the human and themselves, structured as
a relation between themselves and truth, ‘is the philosophical foun-
dation of all possible psychology’. It is one that he sees emerging at
a particular, significant moment, when reason and unreason were
re-established, not on the basis of liberty, but where reason shifted
from being ‘an ethic and became a nature’ (MMPs 103/87). It is there-
fore clear to Foucault why ‘psychology can never master madness;
it is because psychology became possible in our world only when
madness had already been mastered and excluded from the drama’
(MMPs 103/87). He finds, just as he did in the last part of the History
of Madness, glimpses of this appear ‘in lightning flashes and cries’, in
literary figures like Nerval, Artaud, Nietzsche or Roussel. But then,
he ends:
It is psychology that remains silent, without words, before this language

that borrows a meaning of its own from that tragic split [déchirement],
from that freedom, that, for contemporary man, only the existence of
‘psychologists’ allows him to forget. (MMPs 104/87–8)
Instead of the work being written from within psychology, outlin-

ing the different ways that mental illness and personality could be
understood, now psychology becomes one of the objects of the study.
Foucault no longer finds resources in Daseinsanalysis or Marxism,
and takes more of a critical distance from the categories of psychol-
ogy. Instead, the complicated interrelation of psychology and mental
illness, as co-constitutive, becomes a key theme. Foucault provides
a short summary of the historical work he has done, showing the
emergence of what we call mental illness. He therefore tries to set
the work that precedes and succeeds it in this study in a new light.
He does a fairly thorough job of removing overtly Marxist language
from the revision, both through the excision of the Pavlov chapter
and smaller edits elsewhere. This is not a complete reversal, since
much of the analysis here and in History of Madness is indebted to
Marxist accounts, but it is certainly not an orthodox approach. He is
not entirely successful in this revision: hardly surprising given that he
reused so much of the 1954 study.63
After 1962 Foucault tried again to erase traces of this book, whose
new edition Eribon describes as ‘such a mongrel [bâtard]’.64 PUF
did reprint the book in 1966, but after that there were no further
French editions until after Foucault’s death.65 Both Eribon and Macey
report that Foucault also attempted to prevent its translation into
English, but was unsuccessful here too. It appeared in 1976 as Mental
Illness and Psychology, published by Harper and Row and translated
by Alan Sheridan, by then Foucault’s principal English translator.
Foucault’s wish to prevent republication or translation was part of
a consolidated attempt to remove the book from his career. This
erasure extended to its mentions in other works. The first edition of
Naissance de la clinique from 1963, also with PUF, includes Maladie
mentale et psychologie (second edition) in the list of books by the same
author, though erroneously dates it to 1961. In the second edition of
Naissance de la clinique from 1972 this page is missing. Noting this,
Macey suggests ‘Histoire de la folie had become Foucault’s first book
and was to remain so’.66
As Eribon describes it, Foucault ‘completely renounced’ Maladie
mentale. ‘When he mentioned his “first book” later in interviews,
he always meant Histoire de la folie, locking the 1954 work and
its 1962 version away in the dungeons of history. . . and in library
catalogues.’67 For an example, in a 1983 interview Foucault recounts
writing his ‘first book’, History of Madness, ‘towards the end of his
student years, around 1956–7’, and then specifies that it was written
1955–60 (DE#330 IV, 436; EW II 437).68 The dating is significant:
while traces do go back to 1955 and his arrival in Uppsala, and go
forward to the preface written in Hamburg, 1956–7 is crucially sig-
nificant. In 1978 he describes it as ‘my first true book’ (DE#242 III,
669). It was also one he valued over those that came later. As Eribon
recounts:
One day in the early 1980s I asked him which of his books was his
favourite, and he replied without hesitating: Histoire de la folie. He
added, ‘Of course it would be different if I wrote it today, but I think
that book had something totally new to contribute.’69
This rewriting of his past would allow some of his retrospective claims
about his work. In the above-mentioned 1983 interview he declared
that ‘I have never been a Freudian, I have never been a Marxist and
I have never been a structuralist.’ As he adds, History of Madness is
a book that is not Freudian, Marxist or structuralist (DE#330 IV,
436; EW II 437). That may be true if this was indeed his ‘first book’,
but the Marxism claim is difficult to deny entirely if we read Maladie
mentale et personnalité; and his complicated relation to structuralism
in the 1960s is obscured by a later silent reworking of Birth of the
Clinic. The re-edition of History of Madness that same year also loses
the original preface, which had also been explicit about structure.
Then, in one of the draft versions of the introduction to the second
volume of the History of Sexuality, dating from late 1982 to early
1983, Foucault recalls the way that his work links back to his earliest
concerns:
To study forms of experience in this way– in their history– is an

idea that originated with an earlier project, in which I made use of
the methods of existential analysis in the field of psychiatry and in the
domain of mental illness. For two reasons, not unrelated to each other,
this project left me unsatisfied: its theoretical weakness in elaborating
the notion of experience, and its ambiguous link with a psychiatric
practice which it simultaneously ignored and took for granted. One
could deal with the first problem by referring to a general theory of the
human being, and treat the second altogether differently by turning,
as is so often done, to the ‘economic and social context’; one could
choose, by doing so, to accept the resulting dilemma of a philosophical
anthropology and a social history. But I wondered whether, rather than
playing on this alternative, it would not be possible to consider the very
historicity of forms of experience. (DE#340 IV, 579; EW I, 200)70
Foucault goes on to summarize his work in terms that would emerge

at a later moment in his intellectual development, but the key theme
identified here is a good summation of the shift to the work of the
History of Madness.
There is a post-script to this story. Despite PUF’s insistence, over
Foucault’s wishes, of keeping Maladie mentale et psychologie in
print in the 1960s, they later position themselves as the defenders of
Foucault’s legacy and integrity. As noted above, despite Foucault’s
request, an English translation was published in 1976. After
Foucault’s death the University of California Press acquired the
rights, and brought out a new edition in 1987, with a foreword by
Hubert Dreyfus. Both editions are translations of Foucault’s revised
second edition. But the University of California Press had wanted to
publish a translation of the 1954 edition and were prevented by PUF.
The Canguilhem archive includes a letter from PUF to Canguilhem in
which they apprise him of the situation, and which says that the 1954
version should not be authorized. The letter mentions a correspond-
ence between Foucault and Philippe Garcin of PUF, in which Foucault
apparently made his views clear– though of course these were to
prevent translation entirely, and to stop further French editions. On
PUF’s letter, in Canguilhem’s handwriting, is the comment ‘replied/
agreed’.71 As an enclosure, they provide a copy of the letter sent to
the University of California Press. This takes the moral high ground,
saying that they do not authorize the 1954 edition for translation:
for reasons of duty [déontologie]. . . this old edition [is] profoundly

modified in its last two chapters. It is in this new form that we have
produced the three editions of 1962, 1966 and 1969; and all foreign
editions. Of course, the author formally opposed, we are convinced
following correspondence exchanged with him, the republication of a
text which already in his lifetime he had judged to be completely out-
dated. We can therefore only authorize you to reprint the Harper and
Row edition, without any changes. . . [Harper and Row], we consider,
in consequence, are entirely responsible for this work of an author for
whom we must defend the thought and memory.72
This position did not stop PUF reissuing the book in 1995. It remains
in print with that press today; while, confusingly, the English version
now in print is back with Harper, retitled as Madness: The Invention
of an Idea.73
The 1964 Abridgement of Folie et déraison

If Foucault’s frustrations with PUF were attempting to prevent that
book’s republication, his struggle with Plon was for the opposite
reason. Folie et déraison was reprinted with Plon in February 1964,
in entirely the same form as its initial publication; but that was their
last publication of Foucault’s work. Foucault wrote to Marcel Julian
at Plon in November 1970, questioning why the last printing was
in 1964.74 The press’s refusal to reprint again seems short-sighted
on their part, especially after the best-seller success of Les Mots et
les choses in 1966, when you would expect a publisher to capitalize
on an author’s new-found fame. Like Raymond Roussel, Les Mots
et les choses had appeared with Gallimard, and Foucault’s subse-
quent books would all appear with them, in one imprint or another.
Foucault’s letter to Plon was actually written by Georges Kiejman, a
lawyer working for Gallimard.75 It seems to have been intended to
exhaust options before the rights were transferred. The book was
published by Gallimard in 1972, omitting the original preface and
adding a new brief preface and two appendices, one of which was a
response to Derrida; and again in the cheaper Tel series, without the
appendices, in 1976.76 That 1976 version is the one in print today,
with the complete text now also available in the Œuvres.
There is, however, another edition of this work. It also appeared
in 1964, in September, in the 10/18 series with Union Générale
d’Éditions. A cheaper, ‘pocket’ version of the text, it was heavily
abridged. This had been proposed in July 1962, and Foucault agreed
to do it himself, which is in itself revealing.77 It was intended for a
wider, public audience, and to be available as an alternative edition,
not a replacement. Foucault was apparently happy it was on sale in
‘railway stations’ (C 26/30). However, when the unabridged 1964
Plon reprint sold out, until the Gallimard edition of 1972 the 10/18
version became the only one available.78 This was significant, espe-
cially as Foucault’s status in this period changed from an academic to
a more public intellectual.
Foucault begins the abridgement with a brief ‘Avertissement’.
This work is the abridged edition of the History of Madness published

in the Plon Library in 1961. While preserving the general economy
of the book, it has preferred to retain [on a conservé de préférence]
the passages concerning the sociological and historical aspects of the
original study. (FD2, 5/–)
This is an important qualification, as it means that many of the more

philosophical and literary passages are omitted. The abridged version
does not just remove some entire chapters, but also parts of those
chapters that are retained. Most of its notes, all of the annexes (HM
561–73/649–64) and the bibliography (HM 575–83/665–73) were
removed entirely. Only about a third of the original text was included
in the abridgement.
The original book is in three parts, divided into five, four and five
chapters respectively, with a preface, and introductions to the second
and third parts. The abridged version has an abbreviated version of
the preface and just eight chapters, along with a short conclusion.
The preface has the first three pages, and then a cut, with most of a
single long paragraph on the classical age appended to the end. The
discussion of a history of limits, of Nietzsche, the Eastern world as a
contrast to the West, the idea of the absence of an œuvre, and several
other themes are removed. The final pages with acknowledgements
to mentors and the quotes from Char are also cut. Just having eight
chapters means some of the original book’s chapters are removed
entirely; others have just a few pages at the beginning or end of
other sections. Yet even those chapters which are kept are themselves
abbreviated. Chapter I, for example, ‘Stultifera Navis’, moves directly
from the reuse of old leprosia for the mad to the figure of the ship of
fools, omitting the important qualification that first these institutions
were used to house the venereally diseased (HM 16–18/7–8). Three
lines are cut midway through the chapter (HM 27/15) alongside the
long discussion of religious understandings (HM 37–47/25–35). This
means the discussion of Erasmus is reduced, as is almost all of the
discussion of Montaigne and Nicolas of Cusa. Foucault therefore
moves directly from the visual representations of madness to literary
ones, omitting a qualifying clause that was dependent on the longer
analysis (HM 47/35).
The second chapter ‘The Great Confinement’ is similarly reduced.
The discussion of Descartes’s treatment of madness along with other
forms of doubt in the dream and deception is omitted (HM 56–9/44–
7). There are short cuts of a paragraph (HM 59–60/48, 63–4/51–2,
90/76–7) and some longer ones (HM 67–74/55–62; 82–4/69–71).
Chapter III is one of those cut entirely. A paragraph and a half of
the beginning of Chapter IV (HM 124/108) is spliced to a section
about a third of the way through Chapter V, to form the abridged
book’s Chapter III. That chapter makes two cuts from the body of
the original Chapter V (HM 168–9/150–1, 174/155–6), and drops
the last few pages (HM 175–7/156–9). 198 pages of the first part of
the book are reduced to 109, and the 1964 version has smaller pages
and larger font. Yet, it is striking that Foucault almost never makes
changes within the paragraphs and pages he keeps, save for a very few
style changes and in a couple of instances where he writes a few lines
to bridge a cut at the start of a chapter.79 In the abridgement, Chapter
VII, ‘The New Division’ joins material from the original chapter of
that name to some of the otherwise cut Part III, Chapter III ‘The
Proper Use of Liberty’. The 10/18 conclusion simply uses the final
few pages of the original book’s final chapter, ‘The Anthropological
Circle’ (HM 549–57/530–8).
These details, which could be extended by looking at other chap-
ters, give the essence of how the text was abridged for this shorter
edition. It is dramatic reduction, but not a revision of the book, unlike
Maladie mentale. Foucault is also brutal with the notes. The first
chapter of the original text has 115 footnotes, but the abridgement
only seven endnotes. Thirty of the missing notes belong to the text
which was cut, but even so, 78 notes relating to retained text are
removed. These range from specific references to texts cited, which
are often quoted with no reference given, to some short discussions
of specific points or indications of possible future work. Chapter II is
similar: just five notes are kept, when the original book often had that
number on a single page.
Yet it is crucial to underline that 1964 also saw a reprint of the
entire 1961 text. The only time Foucault revised the text for a full,
scholarly edition was in 1972, when he removed the original preface
and set a short new one in its place. If we want to look at Foucault’s
revision of the text it is a comparison of the 1961 one with the 1972
one that matters. Even that revision was limited in scope. As Foucault
told Mauriac at the time, ‘If I had written this book today, I would be
less rhetorical.’80 The 1964 abridgement was for a different purpose
entirely. Foucault’s intention was to create a shorter text for a wider
audience, not to replace the original. While no scholarly French com-
mentator would have only consulted the abridged edition, this was
not the same in other languages. The 10/18 edition was unfortunately
the basis for some translations, including the 1965 Tavistock English
version by Richard Howard as Madness and Civilization. The English
version added part of the chapter ‘Passion and Delirium’ from the
original (HM 243–68/225–50; FD2–/85–116), and it was this shorter
text which shaped Foucault’s initial reception in English.81
As Colin Gordon and others have pointed out, some of the criti-
cisms of Foucault’s work in the Anglophone world were based on the
shorter version, and may not have been valid if the fuller text had been
consulted.82 Yet Gordon’s analysis has sometimes been taken to mean
more than this. Even Ian Hacking twice refers to the material cut in
1964 as ‘suppressed’.83 It is important to underscore that Gordon’s

point was to show the problems created by reading only the abridge-
ment, not to suggest the cuts meant anything more significant. If we
recognize that the 10/18 version was merely a popular abridgement,
then any argument that Foucault removed material he was unhappy
simply has no basis. 1964 also saw a reprint of the entire text with
Plon, and Foucault tried to get it reprinted later. Except for the
original preface and one footnote, that text was reprinted again by
Gallimard in 1972 and 1976 and it has remained in print ever since.84
The one part which did not appear in editions after 1964 is the 1961
preface. That was reprinted by Plon in 1964, but only in part in the
10/18 abridgement and not at all in either of the Gallimard editions.
Aside from that 1961 preface, whose omission is significant,
Foucault’s clear preference was for the full edition to remain in print.
The 10/18 edition was a supplement, an alternative, not a replace-
ment. It was intended for a different audience. The full text was
there for the scholars, the abridgement to reach a possible popular
readership. Between 1964 and 1972, it was not Foucault’s wish that
the complete text was unavailable; it was due to a decision of Plon.
There is one other crucial difference between the 1961 and 1972
texts: the title Folie et déraison was used in both the 1964 reprint and
the abridgement, but it was gone in 1972, the subtitle becoming the
title.85
Coda: Towards Archaeology
There is one further publication from 1961. It was a short book review
of Koyré’s The Astronomical Revolution. Published in La Nouvelle
Revue française at the very end of the year, it might be seen as simply
an occasional piece.1 But Foucault begins to sketch out some themes,
which he will develop over the next several years. Rather than write
a gloomy history of truth, recounting the errors from which great
men have saved us, Foucault suggests that Koyré has done something
different. He has recounted, ‘in grave scholarly voice, the marvellous
and unbroken marriage of the true and the false’ (DE#6 I, 170).
Koyré combines the work of ‘historian and philosopher’, his work
is ‘to take ideas only at the moment of their turbulence, where true
and false are not yet separated. What is recounted is an indivisible
[indissociable] labour, beneath the divisions which history makes
afterwards’ (DE#6 I, 170).
Foucault says Koyré shows that it is clear that Johannes Kepler was
far from hurried in reaching his conclusions, talking of the decade
of calculations and checking, and the decade of fitting the theory
together. He notes how Koyré reconstitutes this path, seeing the rela-
tion between the truth pursued and the errors he sought to bypass.
Kepler can be situated between Montaigne’s recognition of error and
Descartes’s wish to exclude it, for he ‘does not tell the truth without
recounting the error. Truth is uttered at the encounter between an
utterance [énoncé] and a narrative [récit]’ (DE#6 I, 171).
There are many issues raised in this short review, but the language
is beginning to shift. Foucault is talking about truth and error, the
relations between the two, and how they fit into a wider system. It is
190 Coda: Towards Archaeology
not simply a matter of becoming scientific (DE#6 I, 170), but a shift

from one mode of knowledge to another. Foucault discusses énoncés,
which would be the term he later used to describe technical or formal
statements or utterances, and a key theme of The Archaeology of
Knowledge. Language becomes ever more significant. The question
of truth runs as a theme through to his very last works. Equally the
subject matter broadens, which shows an interest in sciences beyond
psychology. Foucault would not trace the history of the physical
sciences; he would presumably say that Bachelard and Koyré had
done this work. But he would employ some of these same techniques
in his archaeologies of medicine, biology, economy and linguistics.
He would, in some sense, formalize this work in The Archaeology of
Knowledge in 1969. By then he would be on the brink of being elected
to the Collège de France, which formally happened on 12 April 1970.
It is striking how much of the work that Foucault undertook in
the 1960s has its roots back in the 1950s, the period studied here.
The work on clinical medicine is directly related to the History of
Madness, Roussel was an interest from 1957, and the germ of The
Order of Things can be found in the Kant thesis. Further ahead,
Foucault’s interest in both incarceration and sexuality begins in the
work on madness. His intended sequel to the History of Madness,
on psychiatric expertise in criminal cases, was never written, but its
theme appears in lectures and seminars in the mid 1970s.
The Early Foucault sits chronologically as the first of four books
tracing the intellectual history of Foucault’s entire career. It will be
followed by The Archaeology of Foucault, which will discuss his
books of the 1960s but also his writings on art and literature, his
abiding interest in the question of madness and Nietzsche, and deep-
ening engagement with sexuality, biology, economy and language.
That future study, already underway, will analyse the surviving lecture
courses and all other available sources from the archives. It will link
directly to Foucault: The Birth of Power and Foucault’s Last Decade.
Together they will provide an intellectual history of Foucault’s entire
career. While they have followed a broadly chronological division,
what seems striking in reading all of Foucault’s writings, published
and unpublished, are links between periods, rather than clear breaks.
On the inside cover of the first edition of Folie et déraison, in a text
which appeared in the 1964 reprint, but disappeared from subsequent
editions, Foucault wrote about the book and this period.
This book is by someone who became puzzled. The author is by train-

ing a philosopher who moved on to psychology and from psychology
to history. Having been a student at the École Normale Supérieure,
Coda: Towards Archaeology 191
agrégé de philosophie; residential scholar at the Fondation Thiers;

having frequented psychiatric hospitals (from the side the doors open);
having known socialized happiness in Sweden (from the side the doors
no longer open); socialist misery and the courage it required in Poland;
[then] in Germany, not far from Altona, the new fortresses of German
wealth; and having come back to France an academic– made him
think, a little more seriously, about what an asylum is. He wanted to
know, he still wants to know what, then, is this language that through
so many walls and locks enmeshes itself, expresses itself and exchanges
itself beyond all divisions.2
The Early Foucault has tried to tell this story– of how Foucault came
to write the History of Madness– in considerably more detail. All
the places mentioned by Foucault here are significant in the story, as
is his post in Lille. I have read what he read, and analysed what he
wrote, either published or unpublished. All the available pieces of
evidence, from archives in France, Germany, Sweden, Switzerland
and the United States, have been used to reconstruct a story. While
indebted to earlier writings on Foucault, as the endnotes attest, I have
tried to supplement, enrich, and at times correct previous accounts.
In the 1972 preface to the Gallimard re-edition, Foucault suggests
that a ‘book is produced, a minuscule event, an object that fits into
the hand’ (HM 9/xxxvii). Foucault goes on to indicate all the ways
that the book is implicated in a whole network of readings, repeti-
tions, circulation, summaries and commentaries. A new preface, to a
new edition, is another one of those moments, another time a book
is doubled, ‘something which is neither totally an illusion, nor totally
an identical object’ (HM 9/xxxvii). Foucault however indicates that
his ‘desire is that a book, at least for the person who wrote it, should
be nothing other than the sentences of which it is made’ (HM 10/
xxxviii). History of Madness is, despite Foucault’s wish, so much
more than that. Against his suggestion, ‘teaching and criticism’ has
not reduced it, but has given it a productive and contested afterlife, or
afterlives. In this book, about the genesis of Foucault’s book, working
backwards even if writing forwards, I have begun to indicate some of
those intellectual and historical networks that preceded and exceeded
it.
Foucault was a student of philosophy and of psychology, planned
other theses before completing the one on madness, and wrote
extensive studies of Hegel, Husserl and Kant, which he chose not to
publish. He made a deep analysis of Binswanger’s work, far more
extensive than the single text he published. He wrote a short book
and two chapters, all commissioned, which he later largely tried to
forget. He proved to be a skilful translator of German psychological,
192 Coda: Towards Archaeology
physiological and philosophical texts. His teaching included psychol-

ogy to philosophy students, French literature to foreign audiences,
and a host of related themes in anthropology and philosophy. Much
of this material he simply seems to have thrown away, and few of his
students seem to have kept their notes. He worked collaboratively
when translating, but these names disappear from his later career. But
much of this period seems to have been spent alone, researching and
writing what was not his first book, but was at least his first major
book, History of Madness.
Foucault’s friend Jacques Bellefroid reports that at the beginning of
the 1950s, Foucault used to joke that one day he would be elected to
a ‘Chair of Madness’ at the Collège de France.3 Perhaps humour was
used to cloak his early ambition. With the publication of the History
of Madness he was well on his way. 1961 marks the culmination of
the early part of Foucault’s career, but also points the way to several
of his future concerns.
Notes
Introduction
1 Jean-Pierre Barou, ‘Il aurait pu aussi bien m’arriver tout autre chose’,
Libération, 26 June 1984, 4. Barou only specifies that the conversa-
tions were in late 1977 or early 1978.
2 David Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, London: Hutchinson,
1993, xix. Foucault appears as ‘Muzil’ in the autobiographical novel,
Hervé Guibert, À l’ami qui ne m’a pas sauvé la vie, Paris: Gallimard,
1990; To the Friend who did not Save my Life, trans. Linda Coverdale,
London: Quartet, 1991. On the manuscripts see, especially, chs. 10
and 13. See also Guibert, ‘Les Secrets d’un homme’, in Mauve le
Vierge: Nouvelles, Paris: Gallimard, 1988, 103–11, 108.
3 Claude Mauriac, Les Temps accompli, Paris: Bernard Grasset, 1991,
43.
4 Michel Foucault, Les Aveux de la chair, ed. Frédéric Gros, Paris:
Gallimard, 2018. See Stuart Elden, ‘Foucault’s Confessions of the
Flesh’, Theory, Culture and Society, 35 (7–8), 2018, 293–311.
5 On working with this archive, see Samantha Saïdi, Jean-François Bert,
Philippe Artières, ‘Archives d’un lecteur philosophe: Le traitement
numérique des notes de lecture de Michel Foucault’, in Franz Fischer,
Christiane Fritze, Georg Vogeler (eds), Kodikologie und Paläographie
im digitalen Zeitalter 2, Norderstelt: BoD, 2010, 375–95; Philippe
Artières, Jean-François Bert, Pascal Michon, Mathieu Potte-Bonneville
and Judith Revel, ‘Dans l’atelier Foucault’, in Christian Jacob (ed.),
Les Lieux de savoir 2: Les Mains de l’intellect, Paris: Albin Michel,
2011, 944–62; and Marie-Laure Massot, Arianna Sforzini, Vincent
Ventresque, ‘Transcribing Foucault’s Handwriting with Transkribus’,
194 NotesNotes
to pp. 1–5
Journal of Data Mining and Digital Humanities, 2019, https://jdmdh.

episciences.org/5218
6 Stuart Elden, Foucault’s Last Decade, Cambridge: Polity, 2016;
Foucault: The Birth of Power, Cambridge: Polity, 2017.
7 James Miller, The Passions of Michel Foucault, London: HarperCollins,
1993, 404 n. 82. For an earlier study of this period see José Luis
Moreno Pestaña, En devenant Foucault: Sociogénèse d’un grande phi-
losophe, trans. Philippe Hunt, Broissieux: Croquant, 2006. This was
written without access to the posthumous publications or the archival
material utilized in this book.
8 Claude Mauriac, Le Temps immobile 3: Et comme l’espérance est
violente, Paris: Grasset, 1986 [1976], 341–2; Le Temps immobile 9:
Mauriac et fils, Paris: Grasset, 1986, 291.
9 See Didier Eribon, Michel Foucault, Paris: Flammarion, 3rd edn, 2011,
95–8; Michel Foucault, trans. Betsy Wing, London: Faber, 1991, 54–6
(hereafter French and English are cited separated by /); Macey, The
Lives of Michel Foucault, 41–2. Eribon’s third edition is updated;
the English translation is of the first edition. I will occasionally make
reference to the first and second French editions.
10 C 18/18; Eribon, Michel Foucault, 98/55–6.
11 Philippe Artières, ‘Un Frère: Entretien avec Denys Foucault’, CH 35;
Artières et al., LMD 8/vii.
12 Paul Foucault, Titres et travaux scientifiques, Poitiers: Imprimerie du
Poitou, 1926.
13 DE#20 I, 293–325; EW II 103–22; Folie, Langage, Littérature, ed.
Henri-Paul Fruchaud, Daniele Lorenzini and Judith Revel, Paris: Vrin,
2019, 265–86, 287–304.
14 These texts mainly appear in DE I, with some translated in EW II. See
also DL, Folie, Langage, Littérature, and LMD. They will be fully
discussed in The Archaeology of Foucault.
15 See Elden, Foucault’s Last Decade, 114.
16 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 73/40; see Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 49.
17 Artières et al. ‘Dans l’atelier Foucault’, 954.
18 The Bastille archives were used for a project envisioned from the late
1950s, but not finally published until 1982. Arlette Farge and Michel
Foucault, Le Désordre des familles: Lettres de cachet des Archives
de la Bastille au XVIIIe siècle, Paris: Julliard/Gallimard, 1982;
Disorderly Families: Infamous Letters from the Bastille Archives, ed.
Nancy Luxon, trans. Thomas Scott-Railton, Minneapolis: University
of Minnesota Press, 2017. See Elden, Foucault’s Last Decade, 192–4;
and Nancy Luxon (ed.), Archives of Infamy: Foucault on State Power
in the Lives of Ordinary Citizens, Minnesota: University of Minnesota
Press, 2019.
19 See Elden, Foucault’s Last Decade, 207–8.
NotesNotes
to pp. 7–8 195

1 Some of Foucault’s notes and notebooks from Lycée Henri-IV are in
BNF NAF28803 (8); ones from Poitiers in boxes 7 and 9–12.
2 Rat gave Foucault his own preparatory notebooks, which are in BNF
NAF28803 (13).
3 C 15–16/14–15; Didier Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains,
Paris: Fayard, 1994, 233. BNF NAF28803 (7), folder 2 has the certif-
icate, dated 4 July 1949. See Programme et conditions d’admission et
de l’enseignement à institut de psychologie, Paris: Vuibert, 1949.
4 C 14–15/13–14; Eribon, Michel Foucault, 59–62/31–3; Macey, The
Lives of Michel Foucault, ch. 2; DE#281 IV, 53–54; EW III 252–53.
Some of his notes are preserved in BNF NAF2830 (38). On the ENS
at this time, see Edward Baring, The Young Derrida and French
Philosophy, 1945–1968, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2011, ch. 3.
5 The famous ‘letter’ was a substantial essay, published as a book and
later collected in Wegmarken (GA9, 313–64); trans. Frank Capuzzi in
Pathmarks, ed. William McNeill, Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1998, 239–76. See also the initial letter sent by Heidegger to
Beaufret, 23 November 1945, in Questions III et IV, trans. Jean
Beaufret et al., Paris: Gallimard, 1990, 129–30.
6 Jean Beaufret, Dialogue avec Heidegger, Paris: Minuit, 4 vols,
1973–85. Only the first is translated: Dialogue with Heidegger: Greek
Philosophy, trans. Mark Sinclair, Bloomington: Indiana University
Press, 2006.
7 Jean Beaufret, Le Poème de Parménide, Paris, PUF, 1955.
8 David Pettigrew and François Raffoul, ‘Introduction’, in French
Interpretations of Heidegger: An Exceptional Reception, Albany:
SUNY Press, 2008, 1–22, 6. On the links more generally, see Pierre
Jacerne, ‘The Thoughtful Dialogue between Martin Heidegger and
Jean Beaufret: A New Way of Doing Philosophy’, 59–72.
9 Jean Beaufret, Leçons de philosophie (1): Philosophie grecque, le
rationalisme classique and Leçons de philosophie (2): Idéalisme alle-
mande et philosophie contemporaine, ed. Philippe Fouillaron, Paris:
Seuil, 1998.
10 BNF NAF28730 (38), folder 3.
11 Beaufret, ‘Qu’est-ce-que Sein und Zeit?’, Leçons de philosophie (2),
361–74.
12 Hugo Ott, Martin Heidegger: A Political Life, trans. Allan Blunden,
London: HarperCollins, 1993, 8–9.
13 A biography can be found at http://institutdesanti.ens-lyon.fr/spip.
php?rubrique2&periode=30. Foucault briefly mentions him in DE#281
IV, 53–43; EW III, 252–3. His notes from classes attended are mainly
in BNF NAF28730 (38), folder 1.
196 NotesNotes
to pp. 8–9
14 Jacques Derrida, ‘Ponctuations: Le temps de la thèse’, Du droit à la

philosophie, Paris: Galilée, 1990, 439–59; ‘Punctuations: The Time of
a Thesis’, trans. Kathleen McLaughlin, in Eyes of the University: Right
to Philosophy 2, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004, 113–28.
See Benoît Peeters, Derrida, Paris: Flammarion, 2010, 391–2; Derrida:
A Biography, trans. Andrew Brown, Cambridge: Polity, 2013, 316.
15 See BNF NAF28730 (38). Among other works, see Henri Gouhier, La
pensée religieuse de Descartes, Paris: Vrin, 1924; Études d’histoire de
la philosophie française, Hildesheim: Olms, 1976.
16 Henri Gouhier, Le Théâtre et l’existence, Paris: Aubier, 1952; Henri
Bergson, Œuvres, ed. André Robinet, introduced by Henri Gouhier,
Paris: PUF, 1963.
17 Derek Robbins, ‘Pierre Bourdieu, 1930–2002’, Theory, Culture and
Society, 19 (3), 2002, 113–16, 113.
18 The critical edition is Qu’est-ce que la critique, suivie de La culture de
soi, ed. Henri-Paul Fruchaud et Daniele Lorenzini, Paris: Vrin, 2015,
33–80; the English translation is of an earlier version: The Politics of
Truth, Los Angeles: Semiotext(e), 2007, 41–81.
19 Jean Wahl, La Malheur de la conscience dans la philosophie de Hegel,
Paris: PUF, 2nd edn, 1951 [1929]; Études kierkegaardiennes, Paris: F.
Aubiuer, 1938.
20 Jean Wahl, Existence humaine et transcendence, Neuchatel: Baconnière,
1944; Human Existence and Transcendence, ed. and trans. William C.
Hackett, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2016. See also
Transcendence and the Concrete: Selected Writings, ed. Alan D. Schrift
and Ian Alexander Moore, New York: Fordham University Press,
2017. The introductions to these translations are good guides to his
work. See also Ethan Kleinberg, Generation Existential: Heidegger’s
Philosophy in France 1927–1961, Ithaca: Cornell University Press,
2005, 84–7.
21 Jean Wahl, Tableau de la philosophie française, Paris: Fontaine,
1946; Les Philosophes de l’existence, Paris: Armand Colin, 1959;
Philosophies of Existence: An Introduction to the Basic Thought of
Kierkegaard, Heidegger, Jaspers, Marcel, Sartre, trans. F. M. Lory,
London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969.
22 These lectures are discussed in Elden, The Archaeology of Foucault.
23 Michael Sprinker, ‘Politics and Friendship: An Interview with Jacques
Derrida’, in E. Ann Kaplan and Michael Sprinker, The Althusserian
Legacy, London: Verso, 1993, 183–231, 191.
24 Jean Wahl, Heidegger I, Paris: Centre de documentation universitaire,
[1952], 94 n. 1, mentions the analysis of boredom in Heidegger’s
1929/30 course The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics: World,
Finitude, Solitude (GA29/30), trans. William McNeill and Nicholas
Walker, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995. See Les
Philosophies de l’existence, 102; Philosophies of Existence, 68.
25 Compare backcover of Jean Wahl, Introduction à la pensée de
Notes Notes
to pp. 9–10 197
Heidegger: Cours donnés en Sorbonne de janvier à juin 1946, Paris:

Le livre de poche, 1998, with ‘Appendix: Jean Wahl’s Letter to Martin
Heidegger, December 12, 1937’, in Wahl, Transcendence and the
Concrete, 213–15, 215. The original of the letter is in the Deutsches
Literaturarchiv Marbach, 75.6908/2. The same conclusion is reached
by Dominique Janicaud, Heidegger en France I: Récit, Paris: Albin
Michel, 2001, 95 n. 55.
26 Jean Montenot, ‘Avant-propos’, in Wahl, Introduction à la pensée de
Heidegger, 7–12, 7; Janicaud, Heidegger en France I, 94–5. Editorial
notes specify these links in some detail.
27 Janicaud, Heidegger en France I, 95.
28 Defert Œ I, xxxviii.
29 Montenot, ‘Avant-propos’, 11. In Dominique Janicaud, Heidegger en
France II: Entretiens, Paris: Albin Michel, 2001, 11, Axelos says he
attended two or three courses by Wahl, but that he found them unsat-
isfactory, and he began reading Heidegger himself.
30 Jean Wahl, L’Idée d’être chez Heidegger, Paris: Centre de
Documentation Universitaire, 1951; La pensée de Heidegger et la
poésie de Hölderlin, Paris: Centre de Documentation Universitaire,
1952. For dating, see Claire Paulhan, Fonds Jean Wahl inventaire,
IMEC, 2004, 6–7.
31 Baring, The Young Derrida, 104–105.
32 I.e. Wahl, L’Idée d’être chez Heidegger, 47.
33 Walter Biemel, Le Concept de monde chez Heidegger, Paris: Vrin,
2nd edn, 2015 [1950]; Henri Birault, ‘Existence et vérité d’après
Heidegger’, Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 56 (1), 1951, 35–87.
34 BNF NAF28730 (33a), Folder 1.
35 Jean Wahl, Sur l’interpretation de l’histoire de la métaphysique d’après
Heidegger, Paris: Centre de Documentation Universitaire, 1951;
Esquisse pour un tableau des catégories de la philosophie de l’exist-
ence, Paris: Centre de Documentation Universitaire, 1951.
36 Wahl, Sur l’interpretation, 1.
37 Wahl, Sur l’interpretation, 33.
38 BNF NAF28730 (33a), Folder 1 has notes on the Plato essay, the 1925
course, the 1936 course on Nietzsche, and Holzwege.
39 Jean Wahl, Traité de métaphysique: Cours professés en Sorbonne,
Paris: Payot, 1968 [1953].
40 Jean Wahl, Vers la fin de l’ontologie: Étude sur l’Introduction dans la
métaphysique par Heidegger, Paris: Société d’Édition d’Enseignement
Superieur, 1956. See Martin Heidegger, Introduction to Metaphysics
(GA40), trans. Gregory Fried and Richard Polt, New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2000. On Wahl’s course see Janicaud, Heidegger en
France I, 169–70.
41 Jean Wahl, Mots, mythes et réalité dans la philosophie de Heidegger,
Paris: Centre de documentation universitaire, 1961.
42 Frédéric de Towarnicki, interview with Jean Beaufret, in À la rencon-
198 Notes to pp. 10–11
Notes
tre de Heidegger: Souvenirs d’un messager de la Forêt-Noire, Paris:

Gallimard, 1993, 251.
43 Jean Wahl, Petite histoire de l’existentialisme, Club Maintenant, 1947,
34–5.
44 Martin Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic (GA26),
trans. Michael Heim, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984,
270–1. Montenot and Janicaud both assume the course mentioned
is Einleitung in die Philosophie, but since Beaufret refers to the pub-
lication of the course in the Gesamtausgabe, this cannot be the case,
since Einleitung was not published until a decade after Beaufret’s
death. Beaufret is wrong that the passage is not in the published
version of The Metaphysical Foundations, but otherwise this story
fits. See Montenot, ‘Avant-propos’, 9 n. 2; Janicaud, Heidegger en
France I, 96; Towarnicki, À la rencontre de Heidegger, 251, 131; Jean
Beaufret, Entretiens avec Frédéric de Towarnicki, Paris: PUF, 1984,
vii.
45 Paola Zambelli, Alexandre Koyré in incognito, Firenze: Leo S. Olschki,
2016, 234.
46 See, among other works, Alexandre Koyré, From the Closed World
to the Open Universe, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1957; La
Révolution astronomique: Copernic, Kepler, Borelli, Paris: Hermann,
1961, The Astronomical Revolution: Copernicus, Kepler, Borelli,
trans. R. E. W. Maddison, London: Methuen, 1973; and De la mys-
tique à la science: Cours, conférences et documents 1922–1962, ed.
Pietro Redondi, Paris: EHESS, 1986.
47 Paola Zambelli, ‘Introduction’, in Jean-François Stoffel, Bibliographie
d’Alexandre Koyré, Firenze: Leo S. Olschki, 2000, vii–xx, xv. Koyré
also takes part in a discussion of Wahl’s 1946 lecture published as
Petite histoire de l’existentialisme, 75–9.
48 G. W. F. Hegel, La Phénoménologie de l’esprit, trans. Jean Hyppolite,
Paris: Aubier, 2 vols, 1939–41; Genèse et structure de la Phénoménologie
de l’esprit de Hegel, Paris: Aubier, 2 vols, 1946; Genesis and Structure
of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. Samuel Cherniak and
John Heckman, Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2000; Jean
Hyppolite, Introduction à la Philosophie de l’histoire de Hegel, Paris:
M. Rivière et Cie, 1948; Logique et existence: Essai sur la Logique de
Hegel, Paris: PUF, 1953; Logic and Existence, trans. Leonard Lawlor
and Amit Sen, Albany: SUNY Press, 1997.
49 Alexandre Kojève, Introduction à la lecture de Hegel: Leçons sur la
Phénoménologie de l’esprit professées de 1933 à 1939 à l’École des
hautes études, ed. Raymond Queneau, Paris: Gallimard, 1980 [1947];
abridged as Introduction to the Reading of Hegel: Lectures on the
Phenomenology of Spirit, ed. Allan Bloom, trans. James H. Nichols,
Jr, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1980 [1969].
50 On Kojève’s seminar, see Kleinberg, Generation Existential, ch. 2;
Michel Surya, Georges Bataille: An Intellectual Biography, trans.
Notes to pp. 11–13
Notes 199
Krzysztof Fijalkowski and Michael Richardson, London: Verso, 2002,

187–90; and Jeff Love, The Black Circle: A Life of Alexandre Kojève,
New York: Columbia University Press, 2018.
51 Interview with Mme Hyppolite, cited in John Heckmann, ‘Introduction’,
in Hyppolite, Genesis and Structure, xv–xli, xxvi.
52 Heckmann, ‘Introduction’, in Hyppolite, Genesis and Structure,
xiii. On this context, see Judith Butler, Subjects of Desire: Hegelian
Reflections in Twentieth-Century France, New York: Columbia
University Press, 1987, and Bruce Baugh, French Hegel: From
Surrealism to Postmodernism, London: Routledge, 2003. Hyppolite’s
work was slightly preceded by G. W. F. Hegel, Morceaux choisis,
translated and introduced by Henri Lefebvre and Norbert Guterman,
Paris: Gallimard, 1938.
53 Jean Hyppolite, Études sur Marx et Hegel, Paris: Marcel Rivière et
Cie, 1955; Studies on Marx and Hegel, trans. John O’Neill, London:
Heinemann, 1969.
54 Jean Hyppolite, Figures de la pensée philosophique: Écrits 1931–1968,
Paris: PUF, 2 vols, 1971.
55 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3M0SJ2sJqg; transcribed as
DE#31 I, 448–64.
56 Georges Canguilhem and Michel Foucault, ‘Jean Hyppolite (1907–
68)’, Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 74 (2), 1969, 129–36.
Foucault’s text is reprinted as DE#67 I, 779–85.
57 Hommage à Jean Hyppolite, Paris: PUF, 1971. Generally, see Giuseppe
Bianco (ed.), Jean Hyppolite, entre structure et existence, Paris: Rue
d’Ulm, 2013.
58 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 32; see Eribon, Michel Foucault
et ses contemporains, 315 n. 1; Schrift, Twentieth-Century French
Philosophy, 126.
59 BNF NAF28803 (1), ‘La constitution d’un transcendantal dans la
Phénoménologie de l’esprit de Hegel (1949)’. The typed copies are
in folder 1 and folder 4, and fragments of Foucault’s manuscript in
folder 2. Folder 1 also includes Annexes, including a summary of its
argument, the sources of the quotations, a bibliography, and a plan.
Folders 2 and 3 include some handwritten preparatory notes relating
to this thesis. Subsequent references are to the version in folder 4,
supplemented by the outlines. There are reading notes in other places,
notably in BNF NAF28730 (33a). On the thesis, see Pierre Macherey,
‘Foucault serait-il sorti de Hegel?’ and Jean-Baptiste Vuillerod, ‘Hegel
et ses ombres: Alexandre Kojève et l’anti-hégélianisme français des
années 1960’, Les Temps modernes, 695, 2017, 91–114.
60 ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, 13.
62 For a schematic outline, see BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 3,
2 versions du Plan.
63 ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, 19–21.
Notes
64 ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, 44–5; BNF NAF28803 (1),

folder 1, subfolder 3, Plan 1, 2.
65 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 2, 1; see ‘La Constitution d’un
transcendantal’, 46.
67 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 3, Plan 1, 2; see ‘La Constitution
d’un transcendantal’, 53, 71.
68 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 2, 1; see ‘La Constitution
d’un transcendantal’, 54 which outlines the three chapters of the
second part in terms of a regressive step, a strictly transcendental
analysis, and a progressive descent [redescente]; 66–7 where they
are empirical progression and transcendental regression; and 68,
139–40.
69 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 2, 1.
76 ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, 99; referencing Hegels
Sämtliche Werke, ed. Georg Lasson and Johannes Hoffmeister, Leipzig:
F. Meiner, 21 vols, 1905–1944, vol. VII, 433; System of Ethical Life
(1802/3), ed. and trans. H. S. Harris and T. M. Knox, Albany: State
University of New York Press, 1979, 114. The German edition has been
superseded.
77 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 2, 2.
81 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 3, Plan 1, 1; Plan 2, 1.
83 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 3, Plan 1, 5.
85 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 3, Plan 1, 5; see ‘La Constitution
d’un transcendantal’, 147, 150–51, 155.
86 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 1, subfolder 3, Plan 1, 6.
88 ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, Conclusion, 11 pp, unpaginated.
89 ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, Conclusion [4].
90 See Terry Pinkard, Hegel: A Biography, Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2000, 228–9.
93 ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, Conclusion [11]. Foucault sug-
gests the Ideas tries ‘to dispel [dissiper] the sphere of philosophical
Notes to
Notes
pp. 16–17 201
reflection as an independent region’, but Hegel stresses the ‘legitimacy

of this level of thought in Absolute Knowledge’.
94 For The Phenomenology of Spirit, I have consulted translations by A.
V. Miller, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977; and Terry Pinkard,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. However, I have gen-
erally translated Hyppolite’s translation, rather than used these, since
this makes it closer to Foucault’s terminology.
95 G. W. F. Hegel, The Difference between Fichte’s and Schelling’s
System of Philosophy, trans. H. S. Harris and Walter Cerf, Albany:
SUNY Press, 1977; Early Theological Writings, trans. T. M. Knox and
Richard Kroner, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1971
[1948].
96 See the ‘Avertissement’, ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’.
97 Hyppolite, Genèse et structure; Wahl, ‘Hegel et Kierkegaard’, Revue
philosophique de la France et de l’étranger 112, 1931, 321–80.
98 Georg Lukács, Der junge Hegel: Über die Beziehungen von Dialektik
und Ökonomie, Zurich, 1948; The Young Hegel: Studies in the Relation
between Dialectics and Economics, trans. Rodney Livingstone,
London: Merlin, 1975; Karl Löwith, ‘L’Achèvement de la philoso-
phie classique par Hegel et sa dissolution chez Marx et Kierkegaard’,
Recherches philosophiques IV, 1934–5, 232–67; Benedetto Croce, Ce
qui est vivant et ce qui est mort de la philosophie de Hegel: Étude
Critique suivie d’un essai de bibliographie hégélienne, trans. Henri
Buriot, Paris: V. Giard and E. Brière, 1910.
99 Eugen Fink, ‘Die phänomenologische philosophie Husserls in der
gegenwärtigen Kritik: Mit einem Vorwort von Edmund Husserl’,
Kantstudien 38 (1–2), 1933, 319–83; Emmanuel Lévinas, ‘Sur les
“Ideen” de M. E. Husserl’, Revue philosophique de la France et de
l’étranger, 107, 1929, 230–65; Sartre, ‘La Transcendance de l’ego’,
Recherches philosophiques, VI, 1936–7, 85–123; The Transcendence
of the Ego: A Sketch for a Phenomenological Description, trans.
Andrew Brown, London: Routledge, 2005.
100 Defert, Œ I, xxxviii. Foucault turned 23 on 15 October.
101 BNF NAF28803 (1), folder 3 contains notes that mention Heidegger
and Kierkegaard on angst. In the thesis, Foucault suggests language
and the concept have an ‘être-là’, but this is in relation to Hegel’s use of
Dasein as an alternative to Existenz, following Hyppolite’s translation
and does not seem to have an Heideggerian (or Sartrean) inflec-
tion. See, for example, ‘La Constitution d’un transcendantal’, 94–5,
142.
102 Daniel Lagache, Œuvres, ed. Eva Rosenblum, Paris: PUF, 4 vols,
1977–82; The Works of Daniel Lagache, trans. Elizabeth Holder,
London: Karnac, 1993.
103 Jacques Lacan, Écrits, Paris: Seuil, 1966, 602, 647–84; Écrits: The
First Complete Edition in English, trans. Bruce Fink, New York: W.W.
Norton, 2006 (the English has the French pagination in the margins).
Notes
104 Alain Berthoz, ‘Hommage à Julian de Ajuriaguerra’, 1994, http://

www.college-de-france.fr/site/julian-de-ajuriaguerra/Hommage.htm
105 Georges Politzer, Critique des fondements de la psychologie I: La
Psychologie et la psychanalyse, Paris: Rieder, 1928; trans. Maurice
Apprey, Critique of the Foundations of Psychology: The Psychology
of Psychoanalysis, Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1994.
106 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 58/30; Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault,
66.
107 See Henri Lefebvre, ‘Georges Politzer’, La Pensée, October–December
1944, 7–10. On this group, see Michel Trebitsch, ‘Les Mesaventures
du groupe Philosophies, 1924–1933’, La Revue des revues, 3, 1987,
6–9; ‘Le Groupe Philosophies et les surréalistes (1924–1925)’,
Melusine: Cahiers du centre de recherches sur le surréalisme, XI, 1990,
63–75; and Bud Burkhard, French Marxism Between the Wars: Henri
Lefebvre and the ‘Philosophies’, Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanity
Books, 2000.
108 Friedrich Schelling, Recherches philosophiques sur l’essence de la lib-
erté humaine et sur les problemes qui s’y rattachent, trans. Georges
Politzer, introduced by Henri Lefebvre, Paris: F. Rieder, 1926.
109 Politzer, La Crise de la psychologie contemporaine, ed. Jean Kanapa,
Paris: Sociales, 1947; and Écrits 2: Les Fondements de la psychologie,
Paris: Sociales, 1969.
110 See Georges Cogniot, ‘Biographie de Georges Politzer’, in Politzer,
Principes élémentaires de philosophie, Paris: Sociales, 2nd edn, 1977,
i–viii; ‘Georges Politzer’, in Elementary Principles of Philosophy, trans.
Barbara L. Morris, London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1976, xi–xv; and
Amedeo Giorgi, ‘Foreword: The Psychology of Georges Politzer’, in
Politzer, Critique of the Foundations of Psychology, xxii–xxxviii;
Roudinesco, Jacques Lacan and Co, 51–54, 56–67.
111 For example, Politzer, Critique des fondements, 184; Politzer, The
Psychology of Psychoanalysis, 112.
112 Politzer, Critique des fondements, 269; The Psychology of
Psychoanalysis, 165.
Psychoanalysis, 7.
Psychoanalysis, 15.
115 Politzer, Critique des fondements, 31 n. 1; The Psychology of
Psychoanalysis, 166 n. 6. The 1928 designation of volume I is dropped
in later editions.
116 See Françoise Parot (ed.), Pour une psychologie historique: Écrits en
hommage à Ignace Meyerson, Paris: PUF, 1996; Noemí Pizarroso
López, Ignace Meyerson, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2018; and Csaba Pléh,
‘Recovering a French Tradition: Ignace Meyerson in Focus’, Culture
and Psychology, 2019, https://doi.org/10.1177/1354067X19851029
117 See Adolfo Fernandez-Zoïla, ‘Ignace Meyerson et la psychopathologie:
Notes to
Notes
pp. 18–19 203
position de la psychologie historique’, in Parot (ed.), Pour une psychol-

ogie historique, 137–47; Frédéric Fruteau de Laclos, La Psychologie
des philosophes: de Bergson à Vernant, Paris: PUF, 2012, 256–7.
118 Foucault to Ignace Meyerson, 1 June [1953], Fonds Ignace Meyerson,
Correspondance 1946–1984, Archives Nationales 920046 51.
119 Alessandro de Lima Francisco, Calçando os tamancos de Paul-Michel
Foucault: um estudo sobre a Psicologia na problematização filosófica
de Michel Foucault com base nos escritos inéditos dos anos 1950,
unpublished PhD thesis, PUC-SP and Université de Paris 8, 2017.
120 Lacan, Écrits, 404.
121 The thesis and early writings are in Jacques Lacan, De la psychose
paranoïoque dans ses rapports avec la personnalité, suivi de Premiers
écrits sur la paranoïa, Paris: Seuil, 1975. The subsequent Points reprint
does not include the other essays.
122 Jacques-Alain Miller, ‘An Introduction to Seminars I and II’, in Richard
Feldstein, Bruce Fink, and Maire Jaanus (eds), Reading Seminars I and
II: Lacan’s Return to Freud, Albany: SUNY Press, 1996, 3–35, 4.
123 His text on Freud’s Die Verneinung is included in Lacan, Écrits,
879–87 and Hyppolite, Figures de la pensée philosophique, vol. I,
385–96. Lacan’s rewritten introduction and reply is in Écrits, 369–80,
381–99.
124 Miller, ‘An Introduction to Seminars I and II’, 5.
125 John Forrester and Sylvana Tomaselli, ‘Translator’s Note’, The Seminar
of Jacques Lacan Book I: Freud’s Papers on Technique 1953–1954,
trans. John Forrester, New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1988,
vii; see Miller, ‘An Introduction to Seminars I and II’, 6.
126 Lacan, Écrits, 405.
127 Alan D. Schrift, Twentieth-Century French Philosophy: Key Themes
and Thinkers, Oxford: Blackwell, 2006, 149; see Lacan, Écrits,
237–322.
128 Miller, ‘An Introduction to Seminars I and II’, 4–5.
129 Jacques Lacan, ‘Le Symbolique, l’imaginaire et le réel’, in Des Noms-
du-Père, Paris: Seuil, 2005, 12–13; ‘The Symbolic, the Imaginary,
and the Real’, in On the Names-of-the-Father, trans. Bruce Fink,
Cambridge: Polity, 2013, 3–4. See, in these volumes, Jacques-Alain
Miller, ‘Indications bio-bibliographiques’, 105–6; ‘Bio-Bibliographical
Information’, 92–4.
130 Freud, ‘Fragment of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (‘Dora’)’, in
Case Histories I: ‘Dora’ and ‘Little Hans’, London: Penguin, 1990,
29–164.
132 Jacques Lacan, ‘Séminaire sur l’homme aux loups, 1952–53’, http://
espace.freud.pagesperso-orange.fr/topos/psycha/psysem/homoloup.
htm. Lacan mentions the discussion as being ‘a year and a half ago’ on
3 February 1954, and two years ago on 19 May 1954: Le Séminaire
Livre I: Les Écrits techniques de Freud, ed. Jacques-Alain Miller, Paris:
Notes
Seuil (Points), 1975, 71, 293; The Seminar of Jacques Lacan Book I,
42, 188.
133 Jacques Lacan, Le Mythe individuel du névrosé, ou Poésie et vérité
dans la névrose, Seuil, 2007, 9–50; ‘The Neurotic’s Individual Myth’,
Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 48, 1979, 405–25. See Freud, ‘Notes Upon
a Case of Obsessional Neurosis (‘The Rat Man’)’ and ‘From the
History of an Infantile Neurosis (The ‘Wolf Man’)’, Case Histories II:
‘Rat Man’, Schreber, ‘Wolf Man’, A Case of Female Homosexuality,
London: Penguin, 1991, 31–128, 225–366.
135 Freud’s papers on technique can be found in Schriften zur
Behandlungstechnik: Studienausgabe– Ergänzungsband, Frankfurt
am Main: S. Fischer, 1975; Collected Papers, volume II: Clinical
Papers, Papers on Technique, ed. Joan Riviere, London: Hogarth,
1953 [1924]; or Therapy or Technique, ed. Philip Rieff, New York:
Collier, 1963.
137 Le Séminaire Livre II: Le Moi dans la théorie de Freud et dans la
technique de la psychanalyse, ed. Jacques-Alain Miller, Paris: Seuil
(Points), 1978; The Seminar of Jacques Lacan Book II: The Ego in
Freud’s Theory and in the Technique of Psychoanalysis 1954–1955,
trans. Sylvana Tomaselli, New York: W.W. Norton and Company,
1988.
138 Sigmund Freud, On Metapsychology: The Theory of Psychoanalysis,
London: Penguin, 1991, 269–338, 339–407.
139 Le Séminaire Livre III: Les Psychoses 1955–1956, ed. Jacques-Alain
Miller, Paris: Seuil, 1981; The Seminar of Jacques Lacan Book III: The
Psychoses 1955–56, trans. Russell Grigg, London: Routledge, 1993.
Freud, ‘Psychoanalytic Notes on an Autobiographical Account of a
Case of Paranoia (Dementia Paranoides) (Schreber)’, Case Histories II,
131–223.
140 Maurice Pinguet, Le Texte Japon: Introuvables et inédits, ed. Michaël
Ferrier, Paris: Seuil, 2009, 49–50, 63–4. The first reference is to a
reprint of ‘Les Années d’apprentissage’, Le Débat 41, 1986, 122–
31. Foucault’s appointment diaries between 1951–55 are in BNF
NAF28803 (5), Folder 4.
141 Pinguet only published one book in his lifetime (La Mort voluntaire
au Japon, Paris: Gallimard, 1984; Voluntary Death in Japan, trans.
Rosemary Morris, Cambridge: Polity, 1993). Other writings were col-
lected in Le Texte Japon after his death.
142 Pinguet, Le Texte Japon, 63–4; see François Ewald, ‘Repères bio-
graphiques’, Magazine littéraire, 325, 1994, 21–3, 21; C 18/18.
143 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 56. See Macey, Lacan in
Contexts, London: Verso, 1988; Élisabeth Roudinesco, Jacques Lacan
and Co: A History of Psychoanalysis in France, 1925–1985, trans.
Jeffrey Mehlman, London: Free Association Books, 1990. For France’s
Notes to
Notes
pp. 20–22 205
posthumous engagement with Freud, see Alain de Mijolla, La France

et Freud tome I: 1946–1953. Une Pénible Renaissance, Paris: PUF,
2012 and La France et Freud tome II: 1954–1964. D’une Scisson
à l’autre, Paris: PUF, 2012; following his earlier Freud et la France,
1885–1945, Paris: PUF, 2010.
144 Max Herzog, Weltentwürfe: Ludwig Binswangers phänomenologis-
che Psychologie, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1994, 115–16; Roger
Frie, Subjectivity and Intersubjectivity in Modern Philosophy and
Psychoanalysis: A Study of Sartre, Binswanger, Lacan, and Habermas,
Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1997, 161.
145 There are a few reading notes in BNF NAF28730 (38), folder 4.
146 Pinguet, Le Texte Japon, 50, 64.
147 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 69; citing interview with
Jacqueline Verdeaux.
148 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 57. See Bernard Gueguen,
‘Hommage à Georges Verdeaux’, Neurophysiologie clinique 34 (6),
2004, 301–2.
149 Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phénoménologie de la Perception, Paris:
Gallimard, 1945; Phenomenology of Perception, trans. Donald A.
Landes, London: Routledge, 2012. A good overview is Claude Imbert,
Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Paris: ADPF, 2006.
150 Maurice Merleau-Ponty, La Structure du comportement, Paris: Presses
Universitaires de France, 1942; The Structure of Behavior, trans.
Alden L. Fisher, Boston: Beacon Press, 1963. There is a folder of notes
on both books in BNF NAF28730 (33a).
151 Merleau-Ponty, La Structure du comportement, i; The Structure of
Behavior, iii.
152 Martin Heidegger, GA6.1, 42; Nietzsche, trans. David Farrell Krell,
Frank Capuzzi and Joan Stambaugh, San Francisco: Harper Collins, 4
vols, 1991, vol. I, 45. In The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics,
Heidegger does use work from biology, notably Jakob von Uexküll, in
this way.
153 Alphonse de Waelhens, ‘Une Philosophie de l’ambiguïté’, in Merleau-
Ponty, La Structure du comportement, vi; ‘Foreword to the Second
French Edition: A Philosophy of the Ambiguous’, The Structure of
Behavior, xix.
154 Mauriac, Le Temps immobile 3, 530.
155 Maurice Merleau-Ponty, L’Union de l’âme et du corps chez
Malebranche, Biran et Bergson, ed. Jean Depruin, Paris: Vrin, 2nd edn,
1978 [1968]; The Incarnate Subject: Malebranche, Biran, and Bergson
on the Union of Body and Soul, ed. Andrew Bjelland, Jr and Patrick
Burke, trans. Paul B. Milan, Amherst, NY: Humanity Books, 2001.
156 Jacques Taminiaux, ‘Preface to the English Translation’, The Incarnate
Subject, 9–13, 13. Foucault’s notes are in BNF NAF28730 (38), Folder
1.
157 Merleau-Ponty, L’Union, 30–4; The Incarnate Subject, 49–52.
Notes
158 Merleau-Ponty, L’Union, 59; The Incarnate Subject, 71.

159 ‘Appendice’, in Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 262; see
DE#330 IV, 434; FL 350. See, for example, ‘The Problem of Speech’,
summarized in Résumés de cours, Collège de France 1952–1960,
Paris: Gallimard, 1968, 33–42; In Praise of Philosophy and Other
Essays, trans. John Wild, James Edie and John O’Neill, Evanston:
Northwestern University Press, 1988, 87–94.
160 Merleau-Ponty à la Sorbonne: Résumés de ses cours, special issue of
Bulletin de psychologie, 18 (236), 1964; Merleau-Ponty à la Sorbonne:
Résumé de cours 1949–1952, Paris: Cynara, 1988. The definitive
edition is Psychologie et pédagogie de l’enfant: Cours de Sorbonne
1949–1952, Verdier, 2001.
161 BNF NAF28803 (3), Folder 7, untitled ms. 7, 9, 31.
162 Merleau-Ponty, Child Psychology and Pedagogy: The Sorbonne
Lectures 1949–1952, trans. Talia Welsh, Evanston: Northwestern
University Press, 2010.
163 His candidacy presentation is ‘Un Inédit de Maurice Merleau-
Ponty’, Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 67 (4), 1962, 401–9;
‘An Unpublished Text by Maurice Merleau-Ponty: A Prospectus
of his Work’, in The Primacy of Perception, and Other Essays on
Phenomenological Psychology, the Philosophy of Art, History and
Politics, ed. James M. Edie, trans. Arleen B. Dallery, Evanston:
Northwestern University Press, 1964, 3–11. His inaugural lecture
is Éloge de la philosophie, Paris: Gallimard, 1953; In Praise of
Philosophy, 3–64. His course summaries are in Résumés de cours; The
Praise of Philosophy, 71–199.
164 Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Le Monde sensible et le monde de l’expres-
sion: Cours au Collège de France Notes, 1953, ed. Emmanuel de Saint
Aubert and Stefan Kristensen, Genève: Mētispress, 2011; The Sensible
World and the World of Expression, trans. Bryan Smyth, Evanston:
Northwestern University Press, 2020.
165 The summary is useful: Merleau-Ponty, Résumés de cours, 11–21; The
Praise of Philosophy, 71–9.
166 Most of Merleau-Ponty’s major works, though not La Structure du
comportement, none of the lecture courses, and not all the essays,
can be found in Œuvres, ed. Claude Lefort, Paris: Gallimard, 2010. It
includes Claude Lefort, ‘Maurice Merleau-Ponty: Vie et œuvre 1908–
1961’, 27–99.
167 See Judith Revel, Foucault avec Merleau-Ponty: Ontologie politique,
présentisme et histoire, Paris: Vrin, 2015.
168 William Lewis, ‘Louis Althusser’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
Spring 2018, https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2018/entries/
althusser/. André Chervel, ‘Les Agrégés de l’enseignement secondaire.
Répertoire 1809–1960’, 2015, http://rhe.ish-lyon.cnrs.fr/?q=agregsec-
ondaire_laureats
169 Alan Schrift, ‘The Effects of the Agrégation de Philosophie on
Notes to
Notes
pp. 24–25 207
Twentieth-Century French Philosophy’, Journal of the History of

Philosophy, 6 (3), 2008, 449–73, 452 n. 6.
170 BNF NAF28730 (38), folder 1, has notes that look like a course by
Althusser under this title. For Althusser’s engagement with psycho-
analysis, see Écrits sur la psychanalyse: Freud et Lacan, ed. Olivier
Corpet and François Matheron, Paris: Stock/IMEC, 1993; Writings
on Psychoanalysis: Freud and Lacan, trans. Jeffrey Mehlman, New
York: Columbia University Press, 1996; and Psychanalyse et sciences
humaines: Deux conférences (1963–1964), ed. Olivier Corpet and
François Matheron, Paris: Le Livre de Poche, 1996.
171 Louis Althusser, Montesquieu, la politique et l’histoire, Paris: PUF,
1959; ‘Montesquieu: Politics and History’ in Politics and History:
Montesquieu, Rousseau, Marx, trans. Ben Brewster, London: New Left
Books, 1972, 9–109; Politique et histoire, de Machiavel à Marx: Cours
à l’École Normale supérieure de 1955 à 1972, ed. François Matheron,
Paris: Seuil, 2006; and Cours sur Rousseau (1972), ed. Yves Vargas,
Paris: Le Temps des Cerises, 2012. Other courses were attended by
Émile Jalley, whose notes are in Louis Althusser et quelques autres:
Notes de cours 1958–1959 Hyppolite, Badiou, Lacan, Hegel, Marx,
Alain, Wallon, Paris: L’Harmattan, 2014.
172 Louis Althusser to Lucien Sève, posted 13 February 1951, in
Correspondance 1949–1987, Paris: Éditions Sociales, 2018, 24–5,
briefly mentions the division of writing tasks between different students
for a pamphlet on anti-Sovietism, including Foucault on ‘degrading
French Intelligence’.
173 For this description I have relied on Alan D. Schrift, ‘Is there Such
a Thing as ‘French Philosophy’? Or why do we Read the French so
Badly’, in Julian Bourg (ed.), After the Deluge: New Perspectives on
the Intellectual and Cultural History of Postwar France, Lanham:
Lexington, 2004, 21–47, 23–5; Schrift, ‘The Effects of the Agrégation
de Philosophie’; and Baring, The Young Derrida and French
Philosophy, 224–6. Baring’s chapter 7 provides a good general discus-
sion. On the longer history, see André Chervel, Histoire de l’agrégation:
Contribution à l’histoire de la culture scolaire, Paris: Kimé, 1993.
174 ‘Examens et concours: Les Concours de 1950’, La Revue universitaire
58 (4), 1949, 228–33, 228.
175 ‘Examens et concours: Les Concours de 1951’, La Revue universitaire
59 (4), 1950, 236–41, 236.
176 ‘Les Concours de 1950: Sujets proposés’, La Revue universitaire 59
(3), 1950, 180–91, 180.
177 ‘Les Concours de 1951: Sujets proposés’, La Revue universitaire 60
(4), 1951, 242–8, 242–3.
178 See, for example, the influence the choice of Rousseau, Hobbes and
Malebranche had on Althusser’s teaching. Yann Moulier Boutang,
Louis Althusser: La Formation du mythe, Paris: Livre du Poche, 2002,
2 vols, vol. II, 402.
Notes
179 Schrift, ‘Is there Such a Thing as ‘French Philosophy’?’ 24–5; ‘The
Effects of the Agrégation de Philosophie’, especially 453–56.
180 Boutang, Louis Althusser, vol. II, 402–3.
181 This is confirmed by teaching materials in the Fonds Georges
Canguilhem at CAPHÉS.
182 Gary Gutting, Michel Foucault’s Archaeology of Scientific Reason,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989, 11, 54.
183 Georges Canguilhem, La Formation du concept de réflexe aux XVII et
XVIII siècles, Paris: PUF, 2nd edn, 1977 [1955].
184 See the Introduction to Canguilhem’s The Normal and the Pathological
in 1978 (trans. Carolyn R. Fawcett and Robert S. Cohen, New York:
Zone, 1991, 7–24); DE#219 III, 429–42. A revised version appeared
just before Foucault’s death (DE#361 IV, 763–76; EW II, 465–78).
185 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 62. On the relation, see Gutting,
Michel Foucault’s Archaeology of Scientific Reason, Ch. 1; and
Dominique Lecourt, Pour une critique de l’épistémologie: Bachelard,
Canguilhem, Foucault, Maspero, 1972; trans. Ben Brewster in Marxism
and Epistemology: Bachelard, Canguilhem and Foucault¸ Verso, 1975
(also including a translation of L’Épistémologie historique de Gaston
Bachelard, Paris: Vrin, 1969). More generally, see Stuart Elden,
Canguilhem, Cambridge: Polity, 2019, and its references.
186 BNF NAF28803 (4), folder 2; BNF NAF28730 (42b), folder 2.
187 Foucault to Canguilhem, June 1965, quoted in Eribon, Michel
Foucault, 175–6/103.
188 Roudinesco, Jacques Lacan and Co, 21–3.
189 Georges Canguilhem, Le Normal et le pathologique, Paris: PUF, 12th
edn, 2015 [1943/1966].
190 Georges Canguilhem, La Connaissance de la vie, Paris: Vrin, 2nd revd
edn, 1965 [1952]; trans. Stefanos Geroulanos and Daniela Ginsburg,
Knowledge of Life, New York: Fordham University Press, 2009.
See Foucault, Les Mots et les choses: Une Archéologie des sciences
humaines, Paris, Gallimard, 1966, 169 n. 1; The Order of Things: An
Archaeology of the Human Sciences, London: Routledge, 1970, 164 n
58.
191 Canguilhem, La Formation du concept de réflexe; cited in draft
manuscript of The Archaeology of Knowledge (BNF NAF28284 (1),
70b-71a), and mentioned in L’Archéologie du savoir, Paris: Gallimard/
Tel, 1969, 195 n. 1, 236; The Archaeology of Knowledge, trans. Alan
Sheridan, New York: Barnes and Noble, 1972, 144 n. 1, 173–4.
192 Canguilhem, Études; Idéologie et rationalité dans l’histoire des sciences
de la vie: Nouvelles études d’histoire et de philosophie des sciences,
Paris: Vrin, 1977; Ideology and Rationality in the History of the Life
Sciences, trans. Arthur Goldhammer, Cambridge: MIT Press, 1988.
Parts of Études are included in A Vital Rationalist: Selected Writings,
ed. François Delaporte, trans. Arthur Goldhammer, New York: Zone,
1994.
Notes to
Notes
pp. 27–28 209
193 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 17–18, 45.

194 IMEC 20ALT/68/1. Ones relating to Foucault are found in years
1949–50 and 1950–51. Some are quoted in Eribon, Michel Foucault et
ses contemporains, 314–5.
195 See notecard on Foucault in IMEC 20ALT/61– a heavy wooden
card-index box.
196 Pinguet, Le Texte Japon, 46; Boutang, Louis Althusser, vol. II, 409; C
17/17.
197 IMEC 20ALT/61.
198 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 68–9/37.
199 Chervel, ‘Les Agrégés de l’enseignement secondaire’.
200 Jean Néry, ‘Menaces sur l’universitaire: À propos des concours
d’agrégation’, La Nouvelle Critique 29, 1951, 28–37. Boutang, Louis
Althusser, vol. II, 409.
201 Boutang, Louis Althusser, vol. II, 427–8.
202 A report of the group’s experience is found in BNF NAF28803 (15),
folder 3.
203 C 17/17; Eribon, Michel Foucault, 71/38; Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 45, based on interviews with Canguilhem.
204 Chervel, ‘Les Agrégés de l’enseignement secondaire’.

1 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 46.
2 Appointment diary 1951, BNF NAF28803 (5), Folder 4. Defert says 1
June (C 17/17).
3 According to Raymond Polin, reported in Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 49, see 111; Eribon, Michel Foucault, 73/40. Foucault is
listed as a 1951 entrant at http://fondation-thiers.institut-de-france.
fr/les-pensionnaires-depuis-1893#54_54e_promotion_1951–1954.
His Carte de pensionnaire is dated 1 October 1951. A letter of 29
April 1952 notes Martial Guéroult as director of research, Mazon as
parrain, BNF NAF28803 (7), Folder 2. It is possible Gouhier replaced
Guéroult, recently elected to the Collège de France.
4 Paul Mazon, ‘1er Octobre 1951– 3 0 Septembre 1952’, Annuaire de
la Fondation Thiers 1947–1952, nouvelle série, (fasc XLI) 1953,
Issoudun: H. Gaignault and Fils, 40. Defert says it was on the topic
of ‘the post-Cartesians and the birth of psychology’ (C 17/17), which
seems to fuse the two topics.
5 Interview of 3 September 1986, reported in Eribon, Michel Foucault et
ses contemporains, 106; see Eribon, Michel Foucault, 73/40; C 15/14,
17/17.
6 His appointment is noted in Louis Jacob, ‘Rapport sur la vie de la Faculté
des Lettres pendant l’année scolaire 1952–1953’, Annales de l’univer-
sité de Lille: Rapport annuel du Conseil de l’université (1952–1953),
Notes
Lille: G Sautai et fils, 1954, 137. His resignation is noted in Olivier

Lacombe, ‘Rapport sur la vie de la Faculté des Lettres pendant l’année
scolaire 1954–1955’, Annales de l’université de Lille: Rapport annuel
du Conseil de l’université (1954–1955), Lille: G Sautai et fils, 1959,
146. In the former he is described as assistant in psychology; in the
latter as assistant in philosophy. See Philippe Sabot, FM 105–20.
7 On this relation generally, see Jacques Lagrange, ‘Versions de la psy-
chanalyse dans le texte de Foucault’, Psychanalyse à l’université 12
(45), 1987, 99–120 and 12 (46), 1987, 259–80; Enric Novella, Der
junge Foucault und die Psychopathologie: Psychiatrie und Psychologie
im frühen Werk von Michel Foucault, Berlin: Logos, 2008; and
Laurie Laufer and Amos Squverer (eds), Foucault et la psychanalyse:
Quelques questions analytiques à Michel Foucault, Paris: Hermann,
2015. One of the first books on Foucault, Annie Guedez, Foucault,
Paris: Psychothèque, 1972, was partly a focus on his contribution to
psychology.
8 Mazon, ‘1er Octobre 1951– 3 0 Septembre 1952’, 40; Macey, The
Lives of Michel Foucault, 46.
9 Sabot, FM 109. There was a 2014 exhibition of Foucault in Lille,
https://www.univ-lille3.fr/michelfoucault/edito/
10 See Jean-Paul Aron, Les Modernes, Paris: Gallimard, 1984; and
extracts from Foucault’s letters to him at this time in FM 121–3.
11 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 106/61.
13 Foucault to Jean-Paul Aron, 17 October [1952], FM 122.
14 Sabot, FM 108.
15 Sabot, FM 110; Basso, FM 150–51; ‘Chronique générale’, Revue
philosophique de Louvain, 56 (52), 1958, 739; G. E. Berrios and J.
I. Quemada, ‘Andre G. Ombredane and the Psychiatry of Multiple
Sclerosis: A Conceptual and Statistical History’, Comprehensive
Psychiatry, 31 (5), 1990, 438–46.
47.
17 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 107/61–2; Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 56.
18 Raymond Polin to Foucault, 17 October 1952, BNF NAF28803 (5),
Folder 1. See Eribon, Michel Foucault, 108/62; Macey, The Lives of
Michel Foucault, 47–8.
20 Quoted (no source) in Eribon, Michel Foucault, 108/62.
21 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 89/50. Canguilhem describes his role as a
moniteur, instructor (‘Rapport de M. Canguilhem’, 547, ‘Report from
Mr Canguilhem’, 26).
22 Gérard Genette, Bardadrac, Paris: Seuil, 2006, 558.
23 Althusser to Professor Ducassé, 31 March 1950, IMEC 20ALT/66/21;
part-quoted in Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 315–16.
Notes to
Notes
pp. 30–31 211
24 Boutang, Louis Althusser, vol. II, 398–9; see Genette, Bardadrac,

444–5.
25 C 17/17; Schrift, Twentieth-Century French Philosophy, 126–7;
Eribon, Michel Foucault, 89/50. For a recollection of this time, see
Pinguet, Le Texte Japon, 45–57.
27 Paul Veyne, Foucault, sa pensée, sa personne, Paris: Albin Michel,
2008, 218; Foucault: His Thought and Character, trans. Janet Lloyd,
Cambridge: Polity, 2010, 131 (hereafter French and English are cited
separated by /).
28 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 89/50; see Jean-Claude Passeron, CH 183–4;
Veyne, Le Quotidien et l’intéressant: Entretiens avec Catherine Darbo-
Peschanski, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1995, 201.
29 Sprinker, ‘Politics and Friendship: An Interview with Jacques Derrida’,
184.
30 Edmund Husserl, L’Origine de la géométrie, translated and introduced
by Jacques Derrida, Paris: PUF, 1962, archived as BEIN 1297.
31 ‘Lettres de Michel Foucault et de Jacques Derrida, janvier–mars 1963’,
in Jacques Derrida, ed. Marie-Louise Mallet and Ginette Michaud,
Cahier l’Herne 83, 2004, 111–16.
32 Jacques Derrida, ‘Cogito et histoire de la folie’, L’Écriture et la dif-
férence, Paris: Seuil, 1967, 51; ‘Cogito and the History of Madness’,
Writing and Difference, trans. Alan Bass, London: Routledge, 1978,
36.
33 Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 233; C 18/18.
35 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 90/50; Passeron, CH 188 n. 4.
36 Joel Whitebook, ‘Against Interiority: Foucault’s Struggle with
Psychoanalysis’ in Gary Gutting (ed.), The Cambridge Companion
to Foucault, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2nd edn, 2006,
312–47, 316.
48.
38 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 48–50.
39 See C 18/18; Edmund White, Genet: A Biography, New York: Vintage,
1993, 431; Marisa C. Sánchez, ‘Foucault’s Beckett’, in Catherine M.
Soussloff (ed.), Foucault on the Arts and Letters: Perspectives for the
21st Century, London: Rowman and Littlefield International, 2016,
121–33; and, more generally, Kélina Gotman and Tony Fisher (eds),
Foucault’s Theatres, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2020.
40 See IMEC FCL 3.8, Cours de Michel Foucault donnés à l’École
Normale supérieure (1953–55) (notes prises et mises en forme part
Jacques Lagrange); CAPHÉS GS 8.1, Cours Foucault. Lagrange would
assist in the editing of DE, and edited Foucault’s 1973–4 Collège de
France course, La Pouvoir psychiatrique. It was his tape recordings
that were the basis for many of the courses’ transcriptions. Simon
Notes
would go on to a successful career as an historian of science, especially

of the relation between astronomy and astrology and the science of
optics. See Kepler astronome astrologue, Paris: Gallimard, 1979; Le
Regard, l’être et l’apparence dans l’Optique de l’antiquité, Paris: Seuil,
1988; Sciences et savoirs aux XVIe et XVIIe siècles, Paris: Presses
Universitaires de Septentrion, 1996. He also lectured on Foucault
in the 1980s and 1990s, particularly The Order of Things and The
Archaeology of Knowledge.
41 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 1, ‘Connaissance de l’homme et réflexion
transcendantale’.
42 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 1, Problèmes de l’anthropologie.
43 CAPHÉS GS 4.9.3, ‘Cours d’histoire de l’anthropologie’. These are
dated to 3 and 20 December 1954.
44 See Sabot, FM 116.
45 Ernst Platner, Anthropologie für Ärtze und Weltweise, Leipzig: Dyck,
1772.
46 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 1r. Heinrich Wichart, Metaphysische
Anthropologie vom physiologischen Standpunkte und ihr Verhältniss
zu den Geheimnissen des Glaubens, Münster: Druck und Verlag der
Theissing’schen Buchhandlung, 1844; General von Rudloff, Lehre von
Menschen auf Gründe der göttlichen Offenbarung, 2 vols, 2nd edn,
Gotha: Friedrich Andreas Berhes, 1863.
47 Foucault took notes on the anthropology of Hegel, preserved in BNF
NAF28730 (37), Folder 1.
48 Edmund Husserl, Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and
to a Phenomenological Philosophy Second Book: Studies in the
Phenomenology of Constitution, trans. Richard Rojcewicz and André
Schuwer, Dodrecht: Kluwer Academic, 1989 and Max Scheler, ‘Zur
Idee des Menschen’, in Vom Umsturz der Werte: Der Abhandlungen
und Aufsätze, 2nd edn, vol. I, Leipzig: Der Neue Geist, 1919, 271–312;
La Situation de l’homme dans le monde, trans. Maurice Dupuy, Paris:
Aubin, 1951 (translation of Die Stellung des Menschen im Kosmos,
Darmstadt: Otto Reichl, 1928; The Human Place in the Cosmos, trans.
Manfred Frings, Evanston: Northwestern University Press. 2009).
There is a file of notes on Scheler in BNF NAF28730 (37), Folder 2.
49 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 1v.
50 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 2r. See René Descartes, Treatise of Man,
French–English edn, trans. Thomas Steele Hall, Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1972; Helvétius, De l’Homme, ed. G. Moutaux and
J. Moutaux, Paris: Fayard, 2 vols, 1989 [1776].
51 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 2r–2v.
53 G. W. Leibniz, Theodicy: Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom
of Man and the Origin of Evil, trans. E. M. Huggard, ed. Austin Farrer,
Chicago: Open Court, 1985; Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, The Education
of the Human Race, trans. F. W. Robertson, London: Smith, Elder, and
Notes to
Notes
pp. 33–35 213
Co, 1858; ‘Optics’, in The Philosophical Writings of Descartes, trans.

John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff and Dugald Murdoch, Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1985, vol. I, 152–75.
54 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 14v–19v.
56 Kants gesammelte Schriften Akademie Ausgabe, Berlin: Reimer and
Gruyter, 29 vols, 1900ff, vol. IX, 25; Lectures on Logic, trans. and ed.
J. M. Young, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992, 538.
58 See CAPHÉS GS 4.9.3, ‘Cours d’histoire de l’anthropologie’, 5v–9r;
IMEC FCL 3.8, ‘Problèmes de l’anthropologie’, 20–9, 32–45.
60 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 62v–63r.
61 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, between 63 and 64. Friedrich Nietzsche,
Jenseits von Gut und Böse, §39, KSA5, 56–7; Beyond Good and Evil/
On the Genealogy of Morality, trans. Adrian Del Caro, Stanford:
Stanford University Press, 2014, 41. This passage, which Foucault
returns to repeatedly, is discussed in Chapter 5.
62 CAPHÉS GS 4.9.4, ‘Cours sur Nietzsche’; IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 1,
‘Problèmes de l’anthropologie’, 46–67.
63 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 86r. See IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 1,
‘Problèmes de l’anthropologie’, 62; CAPHÉS GS 4.9.4, ‘Cours
sur Nietzsche’, 3r–4r. Karl Jaspers, Nietzsche: Einführung in das
Verständnis seines Philosophierens, Berlin: de Gruyter, 4th edn,
2010 [1936]; Nietzsche: An Introduction to the Understanding of
His Philosophical Activity, trans. Charles F. Wallraff and Frederick J.
Schmitz, Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1965.
64 Martin Heidegger, GA6; Nietzsche. The earlier essays were ‘Nietzsches
Wort: «Gott ist Tod»‘, Holzwege (GA5, 193–247), ‘Nietzsche’s Word:
“God is Dead”’ in Off the Beaten Track, ed. and trans. Julian Young
and Kenneth Haynes, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002,
157–99; and ‘Wer ist Nietzsches Zarathustra?’ (GA7, 97–122); ‘Who
is Nietzsche’s Zarathustra?’ in Nietzsche, vol. II, 209–33.
66 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 95r. ‘Uberwindung der Metaphysik’,
GA7, 67–98; trans. Joan Stambaugh, ‘Overcoming Metaphysics’ in
the End of Philosophy, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003
[1973], 84–110.
67 BNF NAF28730 (33a), La Philosophie allemande.
68 Mentioned on ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 95r.
69 ‘Connaissance de l’homme’, 93v and marginal note on 94v. See Karl
Löwith, Heidegger: Denker in Dürftiger Zeit, Frankfurt am Main: S.
Fischer, 1953, 92 n. 1; ‘Heidegger: Thinker in a Destitute Time’ in
Karl Löwith, Martin Heidegger and European Nihilism, trans. Gary
Steiner, ed. Richard Wolin, New York: Columbia University Press,
1995, 266 n. 46.
Notes
70 Karl Löwith, Nietzsche Philosophie der ewigen Wiederkehr des

Gleichen, Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1978 [1935]; Nietzsche’s
Philosophy of the Eternal Recurrence of the Same, trans. J. Harvey
Lomax, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997. Foucault’s
notes on this book are in BNF NAF28730 (33b), folder 3.
71 Walter Kaufmann, Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist,
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1950; Jules Vuillemin, ‘Nietzsche
Aujourd’hui’, Les Temps modernes 67, 1951, 1920–54.
72 Martin Heidegger, What Is Called Thinking? (GA8), trans. J. Glenn
Grey, New York: Harper and Row, 1968. ‘Was heißt Denken?’,
Merkur 6 (7), 1952, 601–11; reprinted GA7, 123–43.
73 Martin Heidegger, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics (GA3), trans.
Richard Taft, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997; Kant et
le problème de la métaphysique, trans. Alphonse de Waehlens and
Walter Biemel, Gallimard, Paris, 1953.
74 Sabina F. Vaccarino Bremner, ‘Anthropology as Critique: Foucault,
Kant and the Metacritical Tradition’, British Journal for the History
of Philosophy, 28 (2), 2020, 336–58. For a general discussion of
this theme, see Marcio Luiz Miotto, O Problema Antropológico em
Michel Foucault, unpublished PhD Thesis, Universidade Federal de
São Carlos, 2011.
75 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 3. I will use its published title: Binswanger
et l’analyse existentielle, ed. Elisabetta Basso, Paris: EHESS/Gallimard/
Seuil, 2021. Publication was delayed, and it appeared too late to be
used in this book. See Elisabetta Basso, ‘À propos d’un cours inédit de
Michel Foucault sur l’analyse existentielle de Ludwig Binswanger (Lille
1953–54)’, Revue de synthèse, 137, 6th series, 2016, 35–59.
76 Defert, handwritten note on BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 3.
77 There are six copies of a single page of the appeal: ‘Binswanger et
l’analyse existentielle’ [73v–78v].
78 ‘Les Dirigeants de l’U.J.R.F. et M. Alain Le Léap restent détenus’, Le
Monde, 8 November 1952, 5.
79 Sabot, FM 113; Basso, ‘À propos d’un cours inédit’.
80 Annett Moses and ‘Albrecht Hirschmüller, Binswangers psychiatrische
Klinik Bellevue in Kreuzlingen: Das ‘Asyl’ unter Ludwig Binswanger
Sen. 1857–1880, Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2004.
81 Eugen Bleuler, Dementia Praecox oder Gruppe der Schizophrenien,
Leipzig: Franz Deuticke, 1911; Dementia Praecox or the Group of
Schizophrenias, trans. Joseph Zinkin, New York: International
Universities Press, 1950; see Roland Kuhn, ‘Eugen Bleuler’s Concepts
of Psychopathology’, trans. Charles H. Cahn, History of Psychiatry,
15 (3), 2004, 361–6.
82 They first appeared in the Archives suisses de Neurologie et Psychiatrie
and all are collected in Schizophrenie, Pfullingen: Günther Neske,
1957, along with another case study. The cases of Ellen West and
Suzanne Urban are reprinted in Ausgewählte Werke, 4, 73–209, 210–
Notes
Notes
to p. 36 215
332. Only two are in English: ‘The Case of Ellen West’, in Rollo May,
Ernest Angel, and Henri-Frédéric Ellenberger (eds), Existence: A New
Dimension in Psychiatry and Psychology, New York: Basic Books,
1958, 237–364; ‘The Case of Lola Voss’, Being-In-the-World: Selected
Papers of Ludwig Binswanger, trans. Jacob Needleman, New York:
Basic Books, 1963, 266–341.
83 Ludwig Binswanger and Aby Warburg, Die unendliche Heilung: Aby
Warburgs Krankengeschichte, ed. Chantal Marazia and David Stimilli,
Zürich: Diaphanes, 2007; Peter Loewenburg, ‘Aby Warburg, the Hopi
Serpent Ritual and Ludwig Binswanger’, Psychoanalysis and History,
19 (1), 2017, 77–98.
84 Roudinesco, Jacques Lacan and Co., 30.
85 Ludwig Binswanger, Einführung in die Probleme der allgemeinen
Psychologie, Berlin: Julius Springer, 1922. There are relatively few
texts from the earlier years reprinted in the Ausgewählte Werke.
86 Sigmund Freud and Ludwig Binswanger, Briefwechsel 1908–1938, ed.
Gerhard Fichtner, Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer, 1992; The Sigmund
Freud–Ludwig Binswanger Correspondence 1908–1938, ed. Gerhard
Fichtner, trans. Arnold J. Pomerans, New York: Other Press, 2003. See
Binswanger, Erinnerungen an Sigmund Freud, Berne: Francke, 1956;
Sigmund Freud: Reminiscences of a Friendship, New York: Grune and
Stratton, 1957. He also had a brief correspondence with Rorschach.
See Herman Rorschach: Briefwechsel, ed. Christian Müller and Rita
Signer, Bern: Hans Huber, 2004.
87 On his earlier work, see Susan Lanzoni, ‘An Epistemology of the
Clinic: Ludwig Binswanger’s Phenomenology of the Other’, Critical
Inquiry, 30 (1), 2003, 160–86; and more generally Caroline Gros,
Ludwig Binswanger: Entre phénoménologie et expérience psychiatri-
que, Chatou: Transparence, 2009.
88 Heidegger–Binswanger correspondence, UAT 443/13; part reproduced
in ‘Briefe und Briefstellen’, Binswanger, Ausgewählte Werke, vol. III,
339–47. It is discussed in Herzog, Weltentwürfe, Ch. 9 (89–106); and
Roger Frie, ‘Interpreting a Misinterpretation: Ludwig Binswanger and
Martin Heidegger’, Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology,
30 (3), 1999, 244–57.
89 On the movement generally, see Philippe Cabestan and Françoise
Dastur, Daseinsanalyse: Phénoménologie et psychiatrie, Paris: Vrin,
2011; Alice Holzhey-Kunz, Daseinsanalysis, trans. Sophie Leighton,
London: Free Association Books, 2014, Part I; and Camille Abettan,
Phénoménologie et psychiatrie: Heidegger, Binswanger, Maldiney,
Paris: Vrin, 2018. An earlier, more historical analysis is Georges
Lantéri-Laura, La Psychiatrie phénoménologique: Fondements phi-
losophiques, Paris: PUF, 1963. The standout study is Basso, Michel
Foucault e la Daseinsanalyse: Un’indagine metodologica, Milano:
Mimesis, 2007. For a helpful summary, see her transcript ‘Foucault
et la Daseinsanalyse’, École française de Daseinsanalyse, Sorbonne,
Notes
14 mai 2011, http://www.daseinsanalyse.fr/index.php?option=com_

content&view=article&id=34:basso-e-14052011&catid=2:textes-des
-communications&Itemid=16
90 See Frie, Subjectivity and Intersubjectivity, 82–3, 86.
91 Binswanger, ‘Über die daseinsanalytische Forschungsrichtung’, 236;
‘The Existential Analysis School of Thought’, 195. See Holzhey-Kunz,
Daseinsanalysis, 13.
92 Martin Heidegger, Zollikoner Seminare: Protokolle– Gespräche–
Briefe, ed. Medard Boss, Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann,
1987; Zollikon Seminars: Protocols– C onversations– Letters, trans.
Franz Mayr and Richard Askay: Evanston, IL: Northwestern University
Press, 2001; Medard Boss, Psychoanalysis and Daseinsanalysis, trans.
Ludwig Lefebre, New York: Basic Books, 1963. See Francesca Brencio,
‘Heidegger and Binswanger: Just a Misunderstanding?’ The Humanist
Psychologist, 43 (3), 2015, 278–96.
93 Frie, ‘Interpreting a Misinterpretation’, 251.
94 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [62r]; see Basso, ‘À propos d’un
cours inédit’, 46.
95 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [5v].
96 Binswanger, Grundformen und Erkenntnis menchschlingen Daseins,
reprinted as Ausgewählte Werke in vier Bänden, Roland Asanger,
Heidelberg, 4 vols, 1992–1994, vol. II; Über Ideenflucht, reprinted in
Ausgewählte Werke, vol. 1, 1–231. There is no English translation,
but see Sur la fuite des idées, trans. Michel Dupuis with Constance van
Neuss and Marc Richir, Grenoble: Jérôme Millon, 2000.
97 Binswanger, ‘Über die daseinsanalytische Forschungsrichtung in der
Psychiatrie’, Ausgewählte Werke, vol. III, 231–57; ‘The Existential
Analysis School of Thought’, in May et al. (eds), Existence, 191–213.
98 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [93v]; see Basso, ‘À propos d’un
cours inédit’, 52.
99 Basso, ‘À propos d’un cours inédit’, 49. For Foucault’s discussion of
Sartre, see ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, particularly 70r–71r.
100 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [17r–30v]; and the half page
between 16 and 17. See FM 124–6, for a short extract from this part
of the course.
101 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [50r–54v, 85r, 92v, etc.].
See Roland Kuhn, ‘Mordversuch eines depressiven Fetischisten
und Sodomisten an einer Dirne’, Monatsschrift für Psychiatrie und
Neurologie, 116 (1–2), 1948, 66–124 and 116 (3), 1948, 129–55;
‘The Attempted Murder of a Prostitute’ in May et al. (eds), Existence,
365–425.
102 Binwanger, ‘Einleitung: Schizophrenie’, Ausgewählte Werke, vol. IV,
341; ‘Introduction to Schizophrenie’, Being-in-the-World, 257.
103 On the case, see Albrecht Hirschmüller (ed.), Ellen West: Eine Patientin
Ludwig Binswangers zwischen Kreativität und destruktivem Leiden,
Heidelberg: Asanger, 2003; and Naamah Akavia, ‘Writing ‘The Case
Notes to
Notes
pp. 38–40 217
of Ellen West’: Clinical Knowledge and Historical Representation’,

Science in Context, 21 (1), 2008, 119–44. Archival material from the
case is collected in Naamah Akavia and Albrecht Hirschmüller (eds),
Ellen West: Gedichte, Prosatexte, Tagebücher, Krankengeschichte,
Kröning: Asanger, 2007.
104 Binswanger, ‘Über die daseinsanalytische Forschungsrichtung’, 244;
‘The Existential Analysis School of Thought’, 202.
105 Akavia, ‘Writing “The Case of Ellen West”’, 140.
106 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [32r–32v].
108 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [33v–35r]. See Ludwig
Binswanger, ‘Das Raumproblem in der Psychopathologie’, Ausgewählte
Werke, vol. III, 123–177. There is no English translation, but see
Le Problème de l’espace en psychopathologie, trans. Caroline Gros-
Azorin, Toulouse: Presses Universitaires du Mirail, 1998.
109 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [34r]. In the translation this is
generally opération, see GK–/229.
113 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [94r–94v]. See Basso, ‘À propos
d’un cours inédit’, 52–53.
115 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [79r, 79v].
116 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [72r].
117 See, especially, ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [6v–9v]. Edmund
Husserl, Idées directrices pour une phénoménologie et une philoso-
phie phénoménologie pure, trans. Paul Ricœur, Gallimard, 1950. See
Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology, trans. W. R.
Boyce Gibson, London: Routledge, 2013 [1931]; Ideas Pertaining to
a Pure Phenomenology; On the Phenomenology of the Consciousness
of Internal Time (1893–1917), trans. James S. Churchill, The Hague:
Martinus Nijhoff, 1964; Formal and Transcendental Logic, trans.
Dorion Cairns, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1969; and Experience
and Judgment: Investigations in a Genealogy of Logic, trans. James
S. Churchill and Karl Ameriks, revised and ed. Ludwig Landgrebe,
Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1973.
118 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [33r]. Oskar Becker, ‘Beiträge
zur phänomenologischen Begründung der Geometrie und ihrer
physikalischen Anwendungen’, Jahrbuch für philosophischen und
phänomenologischen Forschung VI, 1923, 385–560; part-trans.
Theodore J. Kisiel as ‘Contributions Toward the Phenomenological
Foundation of Geometry and Its Physical Applications’, in Joseph
Kockelmans and Theodore J. Kisiel (eds), Phenomenology and the
Natural Sciences, Evanston IL: Northwestern University Press, 1970,
119–43.
Notes
119 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [4r, 8v, 9r].

120 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [73r, 76r]. Martin Heidegger, De
l’essence de la vérité, trans. Alphonse de Waehlens and Walter Biemel,
Paris: Vrin, 1948, reprinted in Questions I et II, Paris: Gallimard,
1968, 161–94.
121 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [12v–13r]. Karl Jaspers,
Allgemeine Psychopathologie, Berlin: Springer, 1973 [1913]; General
Psychopathology, trans. J. Hoenig and Marian W. Hamilton,
Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2 vols, 1997 [1963].
122 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [36v]. Ernst Cassirer,
Philosophie der symbolischen Formen Zweiter Teil: Das mythische
Denken (Gesammelte Werke Hamburger Ausgabe Band 12), ed.
Claus Rosenkranz, Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 2002 [1925]; trans. Ralph
Manheim as The Philosophy of Symbolic Forms vol. II: Mythical
Thought, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955.
123 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [59r]. Medard Boss, Sinn und
Gehalt der sexuellen Perversionen: Ein daseinsanalytischer Beitrag
zur Psychopathologie des Phänomens der Liebe, Bern: Medizinischer
Verlag Hans Huber, 1947.
124 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [4r, 59r].
126 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 2, ‘Phéno et y (1953–54)’.
127 Basso, ‘À propos d’un cours inédit’, 40; Sabot, FM 113; C 20/21.
128 Sabot, FM 113.
129 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 4, ‘Les Themes ψologiques de la phéno
de Husserl et de MP’.
130 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 4, ‘Psychologie et phénoménologie’.
131 ‘Phéno et y’, 1r.
132 ‘Phéno et y’, 4r, 6r.
133 ‘Phéno et y’, [28r].
134 ‘Phéno et y’, [48r].
135 ‘Phéno et y’, [69r].
137 ‘Phéno et y’, [12v, 13r, 13v, 15v, 17v]. Theodor Lipps, Grundzüge
der Logik, Hamburg: Leopold Voss, 1893 and Wilhelm Wundt,
Vorlesungen über die Menschen- und Tierseele, Leipzig, Leopold
Voss, 1863; Paul Natorp, ‘Philosophie und Psychologie’, Logos:
Internationale Zeitschrift für Philosophie der Kultur IV (2), 1913,
176–202; Carl Stumpf, Psychologie und Erkenntnistheorie, München:
Akademie, 1892.Richard Avenarius, Kritik der reinen Erfahrung, 2
vols, Leipzig: Fues’s, 1888–90; Alexius Meinong, ‘Zur psychologie
der Komplexionen und Relationen’, in Zeitschrift für Psychologie
und Physiologie der Sinnesorgane II, 1891, 245–65; reprinted in
Gesammelte Abhandlungen Band I: Zur Psychologie, Leipzig: Johann
Ambrosius Barth, 1914, 281–300; translated as ‘On the Psychology
of Complexions and Relations’ in Alexius Meinong, On Objects of
Notes to
Notes
pp. 41–43 219
Higher Order and Husserl’s Phenomenology, ed. Marie-Luise Schubert

Kalsi, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1978, 57–70.
139 As well as works already referenced, see Edmund Husserl, Philosophy
of Arithmetic: Psychological and Logical Investigations, trans. Dallas
Willard, Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2003; Logical Investigations, trans. J. N.
Findlay, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 2 vols, 1970; Cartesian
Meditations: An Introduction to Phenomenology, trans. Dorion Cairns,
The Hague: Nijhoff, 1973; and The Crisis of European Sciences and
Transcendental Phenomenology: An Introduction to Phenomenological
Philosophy, Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1970.
140 Philippe Sabot, ‘The “World” of Michel Foucault: Phenomenology,
Psychology, Ontology in the 1950s’, unpublished manuscript, 2019,
15 n. 6, suggests that a series of articles by Pierre Thévenaz was
helpful. See ‘Qu’est-ce que la phénomenologie?’, Revue de théologie
et de philosophie, 1, 1952, 9–30; 3, 1952, 126–40; 4, 1952, 294–316,
collected in What is Phenomenology? ed. James M. Edie, Chicago:
Quadrangle, 1962; De Husserl à Merleau-Ponty: Qu’est-ce que la
phénomenologie?, Neuchatel: Baconnière, 1966. Foucault has notes
on this article in BNF NAF28730 (37), Folder 2.
141 ‘Phéno et y’, [28v].
142 ‘Phéno et y’, [45v, 49v].
143 ‘Phéno et y’, [73r–74r].
144 BNF NAF28730 (42a), Folder 3.
145 See H. L. van Breda, ‘Maurice Merleau-Ponty et les Archives-Husserl à
Louvain’, Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 67 (4), 1962, 410–30;
and Edward Baring, Converts to the Real: Catholicism and the Making
of Continental Philosophy, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press,
2019, Ch. 9.
146 On Derrida’s visit at a similar time, see Baring, The Young Derrida
and French Philosophy, 113. Derrida’s 1954 diploma thesis on Husserl
was published many years later: Le Problème de la genèse dans la
philosophie de Husserl, Paris: PUF, 1990; The Problem of Genesis in
Husserl’s Philosophy, trans. Marian Hobson, Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 2003. The supervisor was Maurice de Gandillac. See
Derrida’s ‘Preface’ for the context: v–viii/xiii–xvi.
147 Bibliothèque des Archives Husserl, http://www.umr8547.ens.fr/spip.
php?article305
148 Trân Duc Thao, Phénoménologie et matérialisme dialectique, Paris:
Gordon and Breach, 1951; Phenomenology and Dialectical Materialism,
trans. Daniel J. Herman and Donald V. Morano, Dordrecht: D. Reidel,
1986.
149 Jacques Derrida, ‘Entretiens du 1er juillet et du 22 novembre 1999’,
in Janicaud, Heidegger en France II, 93–4; Sprinker, ‘Politics and
Friendship’, 184.
150 J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck) to Foucault, 26 January 1953, BNF
Notes
NAF28803 (5), Folder 1. Edmund Husserl, ‘Philosophie als strenge

Wissenschaft’, Logos, 1, 1910–11, 289–341; Philosophie comme sci-
ence rigoureuse, trans. Quentin Lauer, Paris: PUF, 1955.
151 For a discussion before the archives were available, see Thomas
Bolmain, ‘Foucault lecteur de Husserl: Articuler une recontre’, Bulletin
d’analyse phénoménologique, IV (3), 2008, 202–38.
152 Leçons sur la volonté de savoir: Cours au Collège de France, 1970–
1971, suivi de Le savoir d’Œdipe, ed. Daniel Defert, Paris: Gallimard/
Seuil, 2011, 198–9; Lectures on the Will to Know: Lectures at the
Collège de France 1970–1, trans. Graham Burchell, London: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2013, 206.
153 Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Notes de cours sur L’Origine de la géométrie
de Husserl, ed. Renaud Barbaras, Paris: PUF, 1998; Derrida, Edmund
Husserl’s Origin of Geometry: An Introduction, trans. John P. Leavey,
Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1978. The latter includes
Husserl’s text, trans. David Carr, 157–80. On the research for this
text, see Baring, The Young Derrida and French Philosophy, ch. 5.
154 BNF NAF28730 (58), ‘Le Discours philosophique’, Folder 1. Another
manuscript with the same title is in Folder 2. These texts will be dis-
cussed in The Archaeology of Foucault.
155 Sabot, FM 110.
156 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 2, ‘Psychologie de l’enfant’.
157 This project was begun in earnest in the late 1960 and included a
course at Vincennes on sexuality, which took this as a theme (C 34/41).
See Michel Foucault, La Sexualité suivi de Le Discours sexualité, ed.
Claude-Olivier Doran, Paris, EHESS-Gallimard-Seuil, 2018; and
Elden, The Archaeology of Foucault. Heredity was promised as a
future project in Foucault’s candidacy presentation to the Collège de
France (DE#71 I, 844–5; EW I, 7–8), but was replaced by an interest in
crime and punishment (OD 71/168). For details, see Elden, Foucault:
The Birth of Power, Introduction, especially 10, 14, 18.
158 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 3, ‘Rapports de la personnalité et de la maladie
mentale’.
159 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 4, ‘Rapports de la folie avec les situations
sociales’.
160 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 5, ‘L’Angoisse’; BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 4,
has notes on ‘L’Agressivité, l’angoisse et la magie’ and ‘L’angoisse chez
Freud’.
161 Jean-Paul Sartre, Baudelaire, Paris: Gallimard, 1947.
162 CAPHÉS GS 4.9.2, ‘Cours sur la cybernétique’.
163 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 7, ‘Psychologie sociale’.
164 CAPHÉS GS.4.9.1, ‘Plan du cours de Michel Foucault sur “La
Psychologie sociale” de 1951’.
165 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 7, ‘Psychologie sociale’, 3–4.
166 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 7, ‘Psychologie sociale’, 5–6.
167 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 6, ‘La Psychologie génétique’.
Notes to
Notes
pp. 45–47 221
168 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 6, ‘La Psychologie génétique’, 15–23.

169 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 6, ‘La Psychologie génétique’, 39–43.
170 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 6, ‘La Psychologie génétique’, 43–7, 47–52.
171 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 6, ‘La Psychologie génétique’, 41, 43, 69.
172 IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 6, ‘La Psychologie génétique’, 86.
173 Foucault to Jean-Paul Aron, 17 October [1952], FM 122.
174 BNF NAF28803 (3), Folder 4; CAPHÉS GS 4.9.2, ‘Cours sur la causal-
ité psychologique’.
175 CAPHÉS GS 4.9.2, ‘Cours sur la causalité psychologique’, 29r–39. I
have followed the archive numbering as Simon’s sequence has dupli-
cates when he restarts the numbering.
176 CAPHÉS GS 4.9.2, ‘Cours sur la causalité psychologique’, 31. Jean
Piaget and Bärbel Inhelder, The Child’s Conception of Space, trans.
F. J. Langdon and J. L. Lunzer, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul,
1956.
177 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 4, ‘Essence phéno et notion ψeg’. Edmund
Husserl, Die Idee der Phänomenologie: Fünf Vorlesungen (Husserliana
Band II), ed. Walter Biemel, Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1950; The Idea
of Phenomenology, trans. William P. Alston and George Nakhnikian,
The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1973. See now Thing and Space:
Lectures of 1907, trans. Richard Rojcewicz, Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1997.
178 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 4, especially ‘L’Agressivité, l’angoisse et
la magie’.
179 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 4; part of which has been published as ‘La
magie– Le fait social total’, Zilsel, 2, 2017, 305–26. For a discussion,
see Jean-François Bert, ‘Michel Foucault défenseur de l’ethnologie: “La
Magie– le fait social total”, une leçon inédite des années 1950’, Zilsel,
2, 2017, 281–303, and ‘Foucault, défenseur de l’ethnologie II’, Zilsel,
3, 2018, 310–33.
180 BNF NAF28730 (46), Folder 4, ‘Maladie et personnalité chez Freud’
and ‘Un exemple de yan: l’h aux loups/La notion de milieu psychana-
lytique’. Another text in this folder has a closer relation to publications
than teaching: ‘Un Manuscrit de Michel Foucault sur la psychanalyse’,
ed. Elisabetta Basso, Astérion 21, 2019, https://journals.openedition.
org/asterion/4410
182 Stendhal, Maupassant, Dostoyevsky and Cocteau were however men-
tioned in ‘La Psychologie génétique’, IMEC FCL 3.8, Folder 6, 37, 42.
184 Sabot, FM 110–11.
Foucault, 6–7.
186 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 28, 47.
187 Genette, Bardadrac, 444–5.
188 Jean Delay and Georges Verdeaux, Électroencéphalographie Clinique,
Paris: Masson, 1966.
Notes

190 Jean Delay, François Lhermitte, Georges and Jacqueline Verdeaux,
‘Modifications de l’électrocorticogramme du lapin par la diéthylamide
de l’acide d-lysergique (LSD 25)’, Revue neurologique, 86 (2), 1952,
81–8.
191 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 58. A range of results from these
tests, and other intelligence and personality tests, can be found in BNF
NAF28803 (2), especially Folder 6.
192 Didier Eribon, Réflexions sur la question gay, Paris: Flammarion,
2012, 374; Insult and the Making of the Gay Self, trans. Michael
Lucey, Durham: Duke University Press, 2004, 252. Foucault’s notes on
experimental psychology, in BNF NAF28730 (44 and 44bis), seem to
date both from the 1950s and the 1960s, with some using Clermont-
Ferrand headed letter paper.
193 Whitebook, ‘Against Interiority’, 316 suggests this was, together with
the work at Sainte-Anne, ‘something resembling a clinical internship’.
194 See, for example, G. and J. Verdeaux, ‘Étude Électroencéphalographie
d’un groupe important de délinquants primaires ou récidivistes au
cours de leur détention’, Annales médico-psychologiques, 113 (II),
Novembre 1955, 643–58.
195 On his work at Fresnes, see Eribon, Michel Foucault, 87–8/48–9; and
Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 56–8.
196 On the institution, see the contemporary account by Docteur Badonnel,
‘Le centre nationale d’orientation de Fresnes’, Esprit, April 1955, 585–
92; and for a retrospective, Nicolas Derasse and Jean-Claude Vimont,
‘Observer pour orienter et évaluer. Le CNO-CNE de Fresnes de 1950
à 2010’, Criminocorpus, 2014, http://criminocorpus.revues.org/2728.
For an official view from the Ministry of Justice, see Charles Germain,
‘Les Nouvelles Tendances du système pénitentiaire français’, Revue de
science criminelle et de droit, NS 1, 1954, 39–63.
197 Badonnel, ‘Le Centre nationale’, 587.
198 Badonnel, ‘Le Centre nationale’, 587–8.
199 G. and J. Verdeaux, ‘Description d’une technique de polygraphie’,
Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology, 7 (4), 1955,
645–8, 646–7.
200 Verdeaux, ‘Description d’une technique de polygraphie’, 645.
201 Delay and Verdeaux, Électroencéphalographie Clinique, 201–9.
202 These themes, the focus of Collège de France seminars and lectures in
the 1970s, are discussed in Elden, Foucault’s Last Decade, chs. 1, 3
and 5 and Foucault: The Birth of Power, ch. 4.
203 See Elden, Foucault: The Birth of Power, ch. 4.
205 Cited in Otto Friedrich with Sandra Burton, ‘France’s Philosopher of
Power’, Time Magazine, 16 November 1981, 147–8, 147.
206 See DE#162 II, 802–5; and DE#171 III, 58–62; ‘Paul’s Story: The
Story of Jonah’, Michel Foucault, Patrice Maniglier, Dork Zabunyan,
Notes to
Notes
pp. 50–53 223
Foucault at the Movies, trans. and ed. Clare O’Farrell, New York:
Columbia University Press, 2018, 135–8; ‘The Asylum and the
Carnival’, Foucault at the Movies, 45–51.
208 On this interview, see Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 158.
209 ‘Travaux et publications des professeurs en 1952–1953’, Annales de
l’université de Lille (1952–1953), 151.
210 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 110/63; see Michel Foucault et ses contempo-
rains, 107.
211 See Basso, ‘À propos d’un cours inédit’, 51–2; ‘What do we Learn from
the Foucault Archives of the 1950s?’, Theory, Culture and Society,
forthcoming.

1 Denis Huisman, ‘Note sur l’article de Michel Foucault’, Revue
Internationale de Philosophie, 44 (73), 1990, 117–18. However,
Huisman’s letter to Foucault requesting the article is actually dated 11
November 1953, BNF NAF28803 (5), Folder 1.
2 Alfred Weber, Histoire de la philosophie européenne, Paris: Librairie
Fischbacher, 6th edn, vols, 1897.
3 Foucault, ‘La Psychologie de 1850 à 1950’ in Denis Huisman and
Alfred Weber, Histoire de la philosophie européenne II: 1850–1957
Tableau de la philosophie contemporaine, Paris: Fischbacher, 1957,
vol. II, 591–606. Subsequent references are to DE, except for the
missing two-page annotated bibliography.
4 Jean Beaufret, ‘Martin Heidegger et le problème de la vérité’, in
Huisman and Weber, Histoire de la philosophie européenne II,
353–73; Edmund Husserl, ‘Phenomenology: Edmund Husserl’s Article
for the Encyclopaedia Britannica (1927)’, trans. Richard E. Palmer,
Journal of the British Society for Phenomenology 2 (2), 1971, 77–90;
‘Qu’est-ce que la phénoménologie?’ in Huisman and Weber, Histoire
de la philosophie européenne II, 343–52.
5 Jean-Paul Aron, ‘Le Nietzscheisme’, in Huisman and Weber, Histoire
de la philosophie européenne II, 219–43.
6 Foucault, ‘La Recherche scientifique et la psychologie’, in Jean-Édouard
Morère (ed.), Des chercheurs français s’interrogent: Orientation et
organisation du travail scientifique en France, Paris: PUF, 1957, 173–
201. Subsequent references are to DE.
7 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 124/71; on the dating see also 89/50. In
contrast, Moreno Pestaña, En devenant Foucault, 217 n. 284, suggests
that ‘La Recherche scientifique’ postdates all the other 1950s publi-
cations, and that it is shaped by Canguilhem’s ‘What is Psychology?’
lecture from December 1956. He also suggests that this is the moment
‘Foucault then became Foucault’ (241). Yet the draft material for this
Notes
piece is filed with pre-1955 materials, along with all the other 1950s
publications in BNF NAF28803 (4), folder 3.
8 Huisman to Foucault, 11 November 1953.
9 Wilhelm Dilthey, ‘Ideen über eine beschreibende und zergliedernde
Psychologie’, in Der geistige Welt: Einleitung in die Philosophie
des Lebens Erste Hälfte 1: Abhandlungen zur Grundlegung der
Geisteswissenschaftern, Gesammelte Schriften, V Band, ed. Georg
Misch, Stuttgart: B. G. Teubner, 1990, 139–340; Descriptive
Psychology and Historical Understanding, trans. Richard M. Zaner
and Kenneth I. Heiges, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1977; Jaspers,
Allgemeine Psychopathologie; General Psychopathology.
10 Foucault’s only reference is to Binswanger, Grundformen und
Erkenntnis menchschlingen Daseins.
13 Foucault, ‘La Psychologie de 1850 à 1950’, Revue Internationale de
Philosophie, 44 (173), 1990, 159–76.
14 Foucault, ‘La Psychologie’, 605. See Albert Burloud, ‘Bilan de la psy-
chologie dans la première moitié du XXe siècle’, Revue philosophique
de la France et de l’étranger, 145, 1955, 1–27; and Maurice Pradines,
‘Méthode en psychologie génétique’, Revue philosophique de la France
et de l’étranger, 145, 1955, 28–42.
15 Foucault, ‘La Psychologie’, 605. See Maurice Pradines, Traité de psy-
chologie, Paris: PUF, 3 vols, 1942–6 (I Le psychisme élémentaire; II.1
Le génie humain: Ses œuvres; II.2 Le génie humaine: Ses instruments).
16 Foucault, ‘La Psychologie’, 606.
17 Daniel Lagache, L’Unité de la psychologie: Psychologie expérimen-
tale et psychologie clinique, PUF, 1949; La Psychanalyse, Paris: PUF,
1955.
18 Jean-Paul Sartre, Esquisse d’une théorie des emotions, Paris: Hermann,
1960 [1939]; Sketch for a Theory of the Emotions, trans. Philip Mairet,
London: Routledge, 1994; Sigmund Freud, Introductory Lectures on
Psychoanalysis, trans. James Strachey, London: Penguin, 1993; Kurt
Goldstein, The Organism: A Holistic Approach to Biology Derived
from Pathological Data in Man, New York: Zone, 1995; Marcel
Foucault, La Psychophysique, Félix Alcan, 1901.
19 Huisman and Weber, Histoire de la philosophie européenne II, 7, 663.
20 See ‘Nécrologie: Jean-Édouard Morère’, Revue philosophique de la
France et de l’étranger, 172 (4), 1982, 701. His essay ‘La Photométrie:
les sources de l’essai d’optique sur la gradation de la lumière de Pierre
Bouguer’, Revue d’histoire des sciences et de leurs applications, 18
(4), 1965, 337–84 was based on a presentation given to Canguilhem’s
seminar at the Institut d’Histoire des Sciences et des Techniques in
February 1963.
21 G. H., ‘Note liminaire’, Morère (ed.), Des chercheurs français s’inter-
rogent, 7.
Notes to
Notes
pp. 60–66 225
22 It is most explicit in The Archaeology of Knowledge. For a discussion,

see Andree Smaranda Aldea and Amy Allen (eds) ‘Historical a priori in
Husserl and Foucault’, Continental Philosophy Review, 49 (1), 2016.
25 BNF NAF28803 (4), folder 3, ‘La Recherche sc. en y’.
26 Virgil, Aeneid, VII, 312. As well as the book’s epigraph, see also On
the Interpretation of Dreams, trans. James Strachey, London: Penguin,
1991, 769. In the latter place he adds: ‘The interpretation of dreams
is the royal road to a knowledge of the unconscious activities of the
mind.’ Foucault actually misquotes the Latin, writing ‘Superos si
flectere nequeo, Acheronta movebo.’ This same misquotation is found
in an untitled six-page manuscript in BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 1,
‘Cette vocation infernale de la y’, 1.
27 Morère, Des chercheurs français s’interrogent, 6.
28 Huisman and Weber, Histoire de la philosophie européenne II, 6. See
Huisman, ‘Note sur l’article de Michel Foucault’, 177, which also
mentions the Institute of Psychology in Lille.
29 Louis Althusser, Lettres à Hélène 1947–1980, ed. Olivier Corpet,
Bernard Grasset/IMEC (Le Livre de Poche), 2011, 180–1. See also
Boutang, Louis Althusser, vol. II, 437, 446–7, which also discusses
the link to Lacroix, and suggests that this ‘manual of Marxist psy-
chology’ (446) is the closest that Foucault came to Althusser. At the
time Lacroix was best known for Marxisme, existentialisme, per-
sonnalisme: Présence de l’éternité dans le temps, Paris: PUF, 1950.
See Louis Althusser, ‘Lettre à Jean Lacroix (1950–1951)’, in Écrits
philosophiques et politiques, ed. François Matheron, Paris: Le Livre de
Poche, 1999, vol. I, 285–333.
30 Archived as IMEC BP ALT B271/24.
31 Jean Lacroix to Foucault, 25 February 1953, BNF NAF28803 (5),
Folder 1.
32 Jean Lacroix, Les Sentiments et la vie morale, Paris: PUF, 1952; Gaston
Berger, Caractère et personnalité, Paris: PUF, 1954; Henri Lefebvre,
Problèmes actuels du marxisme, Paris: PUF, 1958; and Althusser,
Montesquieu. See Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 64.
33 Lacroix to Foucault, 1 October 1953, BNF NAF28803 (5), Folder 1.
34 Fragments of a draft of the 1954 text are in BNF NAF28730 (65),
Folder 1, where a typescript is used as scrap paper for the writing of
texts about Nietzsche and other philosophical themes.
35 Foucault specifically references Goldstein’s article published in Journal
de psychologie in 1933, reprinted as ‘L’Analyse de l’aphasie et l’étude
de l’essence du langage’ (1933) in Selected Papers/Ausgewählte
Schriften, ed. Aron Gurwitsch et al., The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff,
1971, 282–344.
36 Foucault references the lectures as 1874, but his own chronology shows
the correct date (MMPe 111; MMPs 105/89). See Selected Writings of
Notes
John Hughlings Jackson Volume Two, ed. James Taylor, London:

Staples Press, 1958, 3–118.
37 A more explicitly Freudian discussion can be found in ‘Un Manuscrit
de Michel Foucault’. Basso suggests that this is draft material from the
book.
38 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 121/70. A manuscript page in BNF
NAF28730 (65) Folder 1, probably from the same time, talks of ‘a
spontaneous archaeology of behaviour’.
39 ‘Un Manuscrit de Michel Foucault’ provides a more sustained discus-
sion of Freud, exploring how he moves from a biological approach
based on evolutionism to a more properly psychological understanding
of mental illness.
40 Henri Wallon, Les Origines du caractère chez l’enfant: Les Preludes
du sentiment de personnalité, Paris: Boivin and Cie, 1934. See also ‘Un
Manuscrit de Michel Foucault’.
41 Anna Freud, The Ego and Mechanisms of Defence, trans. Cecil Baines,
London: Karnac, 1993, 44.
42 Foucault references Jakob Wyrsch, Die Person des Schizophrenen:
Studien zur Klinik, Psychologie, Daseinsweise, Bern: Paul Haupt,
1949; later translated by Jacqueline Verdeaux as La personne du schiz-
ophrène: Étude clinique, psychologique anthrophénoménologie, Paris:
PUF, 1956 (MMPe 57 n. 1; MMPs 57 n. 1/57 n. 2).
43 Eugène Minkowski, Les Temps vécu: Études phénoménologiques
et psychopathologiques, PUF: Paris, 1995 [1933]; Lived Time:
Phenomenological and Psychopathological Studies, trans. Nancy
Metzel, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1970.
44 Binswanger, ‘Der Fall Jürg Zünd: Studien zum Schizophrenieproblem’,
Schizophrenie, 189–288.
45 See Minkowski, Les Temps vécu, ‘Vers une psychopathologie de l’es-
pace’, 366–98, especially 372, 392–96; ‘Towards a Psychopathology of
Lived Space’, Lived Time, 399–433, especially 405–6, 427–31. There
are notes on ‘L’Espace vécu– Le Temps vécu’ in BNF NAF28730
(42b), Folder 2.
46 Foucault does not provide a reference and it is not marked as a quo-
tation from Kuhn, but he is probably thinking of ‘Daseinsanalytische
Studie über die Bedeutung von Grenzen im Wahn’, Monatsschrift für
Psychiatrie und Neurologie, 124, 1952, 354–83.
47 Kuhn, ‘Mordversuch’, 123; ‘The Attempted Murder of a Prostitute’,
408.
48 Ludwig Binswanger, Wandlungen in der Auffassung und Deutung des
Traumes von den Griechen bis zur Gegenwart, Julius Springer, Berlin,
1928, especially 7–11.
49 The text actually reads ‘dimensions extérieures’, but this is clearly a
misprint. See James W. Bernauer, Michel Foucault’s Force of Flight:
Toward an Ethics of Thought, New Jersey: Humanities Press, 1990,
187.
Notes to
Notes
pp. 71–79 227
50 His sources include Emile Durkheim, Les Règles de la méthode soci-

ologique, Paris: Félix Alcan, 1894; The Rules of Sociological Method,
trans. Sarah A. Solovay and John H. Mueller, ed. George E. G. Catlin,
New York: The Free Press, 1938; Ruth Benedict, Échantillons de civili-
sations, Gallimard, 1950, a translation of Patterns of Culture, London:
Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1935; and Robert H. Lowie, The Crow
Indians, New York: Farrar and Rinehart, 1935.
51 I. P. Pavlov, Conditioned Reflexes: An Investigation of the Physiological
Activity of the Cerebral Cortex, trans. G. V. Anrep, Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1927; Lectures on Conditioned Reflexes, trans.
W. Horsley Gantt, London: Lawrence and Wishart, 2 vols, 1928,
quoted in MMPe 93.
52 Foucault just says ‘Bykov’, and does not provide a year.
53 ‘Misère de la psychiatrie’, Esprit 20 (12), 1952.
54 Roland Caillois, ‘Michel Foucault, Maladie mentale et personnalité’,
Critique, XI (93), 1955, 189–90, 189.
55 Caillois, ‘Michel Foucault’, 190.
56 D. Anzieu, ‘Michel Foucault, Maladie mentale et personnalité’, Revue
philosophique de la France et de l’étranger, 148, 1958, 279–80.
57 Lacroix, ‘La Signification de la folie’, 8.
58 Pierre Macherey, ‘Aux sources de “l’Histoire de la folie”: Une rec-
tification et ses limites’, Critique 471–2, 1986, 753–74, 753. As
well as Macherey’s invaluable account, good discussions of the
book can be found in Hubert Dreyfus, ‘Foreword to the California
Edition’, MMPs–/vii–xliii; Gutting, Michel Foucault’s Archaeology
of Scientific Reason, 56–9, 64–9; Bernauer, Michel Foucault’s Force
of Flight, 24–36; Line Joranger, ‘Individual Perception and Cultural
Development: Foucault’s 1954 Approach to Mental Illness and its
History’, History of Psychology, 19 (1), 40–51; and Luca Paltrinieri,
‘Philosophie, psychologie, histoire dans les années 1950. Maladie men-
tale et personnalité comme analyseur’, in G. Bianco and F. Fruteau de
Laclos (eds), L’Angle mort des années 1950: Philosophie et sciences de
l’homme en France, Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 2016, 169–91.
61 Miller, The Passions of Michel Foucault, 63; 403–4 n. 82.
63 Macherey, ‘Aux sources de “l’Histoire de la folie”’, 761.
64 Macherey, ‘Aux sources de “l’Histoire de la folie”’, 755.
65 Merleau-Ponty, La Structure du comportement, especially 75–88; The
Structure of Behavior, 52–62; Psychologie et pédagogie de l’enfant,
458–9; Child Psychology and Pedagogy, 367–8. Although mentioned
in the draft typescript of MMPe in BNF NAF28803 (4), folder 2,
Merleau-Ponty is absent from the published book.
67 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 120/69; see Michel Foucault et ses
Notes
c ontemporains, 316–17. See ‘Editorial’, La Raison: Cahiers de psy-

chopathologie scientifique, 1, 1951, 5–12. 5–9 is reprinted as ‘Où
va la psychiatrie?’ La Nouvelle Critique, 22, 1951, 104–9. The
first is unsigned, the second by ‘XXX’. The most relevant pages are
8–9/108–9. The same issue of La raison published Ivan Pavlov, ‘Un
Document fundamental: Les Réflexes conditionnés’, trans. Vereb and
A. Engelergueres, 13–26; originally from the Grande Encyclopédie
médicale russe, 1934. Foucault took a page of notes on ‘Analyse du
numéro 1 de “La Raison” par le Dr Lountz’, La Raison, 3, 120–5,
BNF NAF28730 (44), Folder 2. On debates at the time, see also Jean T.
Desanti, ‘La science, la lutte des classes et l’esprit de parti’, La Nouvelle
Critique, 22, 1951, 44–60; reprinted along with other related works in
Jean-Toussaint Desanti, Une Pensée captive: Articles de La Nouvelle
Critique (1948–1956), ed. Maurice Caving, Paris: PUF, 2008.
68 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 94/53; C 18/18; see Macey, The Lives of
Michel Foucault, 38. While unclear if this lecture has survived, one
possibility is the text ‘Le réflexe’, BNF NAF28003 (2), folder 4, sub-
folder 3.
70 The published version adds an inaccurate date. I have followed
the transcript. BNF NAF28730 (83), Entretiens avec Trombadori,
22–3.
71 Reported in Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 59.
72 Membership cards are in BNF NAF28803 (5), folder 4. Veyne,
Foucault, 281/131, recalls Foucault being critical of the party in 1954.

1 Premier congrès mondial de psychiatrie, Paris, 1950, ed. Henri Ey,
Pierre Marty and Jean-Joseph Dublineau, Paris, Hermann, 8 vols,
1952, vol. I, 381–4 summarizes this session; vol. VIII has a list of
attendees, including Kuhn, Lacan and Verdeaux, but not Foucault.
2 Ludwig Binswanger to Jacqueline Verdeaux, 9 October 1950, UAT
443/1205.
3 Ludwig Binswanger, ‘La “Daseinsanalyse” en Psychiatrie’,
L’Encéphale, 40 (1), 1951, 108–13. See 108 n. 1 for the translator and
editor details; and Georges Verdeaux to Binswanger, 1 October 1951,
UAT 42/1205, which clarifies that it was indeed Victor Gourevitch,
not Michel Gourévitch.
4 Ruth Bochner and Florence Halpern, The Clinical Application of
the Rorschach Test, New York: Grune and Stratton, 2nd edn, 1945
[1942]; L’Application clinique du test de Rorschach, trans. André
Ombredane and G. and J. Verdeaux, Paris: PUF, 1948. See also
Hermann Rorschach, Psychodiagnostic: Méthodes et résultats d’une
Notes to
Notes
pp. 80–81 229
expérience diagnostique de perception, trans. André Ombredane and

Augustine Landau, Paris: PUF, 1947.
5 The Verdeaux–Kuhn correspondence begins in 1947: StATG 9’40,
3.1.82/0; see ‘Correspondance Gaston Bachelard et Roland Kuhn:
1947–1957’, ed. Elisabetta Basso, Revue de synthèse, 137 (1–2),
2016, 177–89. See also ‘Correspondance Gaston Bachelard–Ludwig
Binswanger (1948–1955)’, ed. Elisabetta Basso and Emmanuel Delille,
Revue Germanique Internationale, 30, 2019, 183–208; and Elisabetta
Basso, ‘“Une Science de fous et de génies”: La Phénoménologie psy-
chiatrique à la lumière de la correspondance échangée entre Gaston
Bachelard, Roland Kuhn et Ludwig Binswanger’, Revue Germanique
Internationale, 30, 2019, 131–50.
6 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 29 December 1947, UAT
443/1206.
7 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 80/44. In another intriguing parallel,
Rorschach worked at the clinic between 1909 and 1913. Damion
Searls, The Inkblots: Hermann Rorschach, His Iconic Test and the
Power of Seeing, New York: Crown, 2017, 66.
8 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Kuhn, 20 January 1950, StATG 9’40, 3.1.81/0.
9 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 27 July 1952, UAT 443/1205.
10 Roland Kuhn, ‘Über Maskendeutungen im Rorschachschen Versuch’,
Monatsschrift für Psychiatrie und Neurologie, 107 (1–2), 1943, 1–60;
reprinted as Maskendeutungen im Rorschachschen Versuch, Basel,
S. Karger, 1944; Phénoménologie du masque à travers le Test de
Rorschach, trans. Jacqueline Verdeaux, preface by Gaston Bachelard,
Paris: Desclée de Brower, 1957. References are to the 1992 re-edition
of the French text with a preface by Verdeaux (7–14), and a postface
by Kuhn (217–21). On Rorschach, with some reference to Kuhn and
Binswanger, see Naamah Akavia, Subjectivity in Motion: Life, Art, and
Movement in the Work of Hermann Rorschach, London: Routledge,
2013. Wyrsch references are in chapter 3.
11 Ludwig Binswanger, ‘La Conception de l’homme, chez Freud,
à la lumière de l’anthropologie philosophique’, trans. H. Pollnow,
L’Évolution psychiatrique, 10 (1), 1938, 3–34 (retrans. Roger Lewinter
in Analyse existentielle et psychanalyse freudienne: Discours, par-
cours, et Freud, Paris: Gallimard, 1970, 201–37). More generally, see
Elisabetta Basso, ‘The Clinical Epistemology of Ludwig Binswanger
(1881–1966): Psychiatry as a Science of the Singular’, in Alan Blum
and Stuart J. Murray (eds), The Ethics of Care: Moral Knowledge,
Communication, and the Art of Caregiving, London: Routledge, 2017,
179–93; and especially Jacob Needleman, ‘A Critical Introduction to
Ludwig Binswanger’s Existential Psychoanalysis’, in Being-In-the-
World, 7–145.
12 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 6 May 1953, UAT 443/1206.
13 Binswanger to Jacqueline Verdeaux, 16 May 1953, UAT 443/1206.
14 Roland Kuhn, ‘L’Essai de Ludwig Binswanger, Le Rêve et l’existence,
Notes
et sa signification pour la psychothérapie’, trans. Raphaël Célis, in

Écrits sur l’analyse existentielle, ed. Jean-Claude Marceau, Paris:
L’Harmattan, 2007, 309–20, 309. Kuhn also suggests the translation
was through his mediation (311).
15 Kuhn, Phénoménologie du masque, 68, 215.
16 Postcard from Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 2 January 1954;
letter 23 February 1954, UAT 443/1206; Basso in FM 176.
17 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 23 February 1954, UAT 443/1206.
60. Eribon suggests they translated it together in Réflexions sur la
question gay, 375; Insult and the Making of the Gay Self, 253.
19 Eduard Mörike, Maler Nolten, Stuttgart: Schweizerbart, 1832; Nolten,
the Painter, trans. Rayleigh Whitinger, Rochester NY: Camden House,
2005.
20 Foucault does not provide a line number, but it can be found in Johann
Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, I, 1092–9.
21 Jacqueline Verdeaux and Roland Kuhn, ‘Glossaire’, in Ludwig
Binswanger, Introduction à l’analyse existentielle, trans. J. Verdeaux
and R. Kuhn, Paris: Minuit, 1971, 30.
23 Martin Heidegger, Sein und Zeit, Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 7th edn,
1993 [1927], 42; Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward
Robinson, Oxford: Blackwell, 1962, 67. For a discussion of Existenz
in the context of Binswanger’s essay, see Forrest Williams, DIE
20.
24 Martin Heidegger, ‘Was ist Metaphysik?’ GA9, 103–22; ‘Qu’est-ce
que la métaphysique?’ trans. Henri Corbin-Petithenry, Bifur, 8, 1931,
9–27, 9, 17, 18, 20; Qu’est-ce que la métaphysique? suivi d’extraits sur
l’être et le temps et d’une conférence sur Hölderlin, trans. Henri Corbin,
Paris: Gallimard, 1938, i.e. 22. Compare ‘What is Metaphysics?’ in
Pathmarks, ed. William McNeill, Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1998, 82–96.
25 Stefanos Geroulanos, An Atheism that is not Humanist Emerges in
French Thought, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2010, 53, 79–80.
See Sylvain Camilleri and Daniel Proulx, ‘Martin Heidegger– Henry
Corbin: Lettres et documents (1930–1941)’, Bulletin Heideggerian, 4,
2014, 4–63; Christian Jambet (ed.), Cahier de l’Herne Henry Corbin,
Paris, L’Herne, 1981 and Rebecca Bligh, The Réalité-humaine of
Henry Corbin, unpublished PhD thesis, Goldsmiths University, 2011,
http://research.gold.ac.uk/7800/1/HIS_Bligh_thesis_2012.pdf
26 Jacques Derrida, Marges– d e la philosophie, Paris: Minuit, 1972,
136; Margins of Philosophy, trans. Alan Bass, Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1982, 115.
27 Janicaud, Heidegger en France II, 91. See Baring, The Young Derrida
and French Philosophy, 74–5.
28 Baring, The Young Derrida and French Philosophy, 273. The reference
Notes to
Notes
pp. 83–88 231
is to the Sorbonne course from 1961–2, IMEC DRR 219.13, ‘Le sens
du transcendantal’, lecture of 20 March 1962, 10r.
29 Jacques Derrida, Heidegger: La Question de l’être et l’histoire, ed.
Thomas Dutoit, Paris: Galilée, 2013, 75–7.
30 A[lphonse] de Waelhens, La Philosophie de Martin Heidegger,
Louvain: l’Institut supérieur de philosophie, 1946 [1942]. On this
book and its impact in France, see Baring, Converts to the Real, 225–8.
31 Binswanger, ‘La “Daseinsanalyse” en Psychiatrie’, 108.
33 Binswanger, ‘La “Daseinsanalyse” en Psychiatrie’, 108–9.
35 Henri Maldiney, ‘Le Dévoilement des concepts fondamentaux de la
psychologie à travers la Daseinsanalyse de L. Binswanger (1963)’, in
Regard, Parole, Espace, Lausanne: L’Age d’homme, 1973, 92. See
Henri Maldiney and Roland Kuhn, Rencontre– Begegnung: Au péril
d’exister, Briefwechsel Correspondance Français Deutsch, 1953–2004,
ed. Liselotte Rutishauser and Robert Christe, Würzburg: Königshausen
and Neumann, 2017.
36 Heidegger, Sein und Zeit, 184; Being and Time, 228.
37 Verdeaux, note to Binswanger, Introduction à l’analyse existentielle,
201 n. 2.
38 Verdeaux, note to Binswanger, Introduction à l’analyse existentielle,
208 n. 6.
39 Compare to a 1976 lecture where Foucault uses pulsion (DE#297 IV,
183; SKP 153).
40 Maldiney, ‘Ludwig Binswanger’, in Regard, Parole, Espace, 209.
41 Ludwig Binswanger, ‘Traum und Existenz’, Neue Schweizer
Rundschau, XXIII (IX), 1930, 673–85; XXIII (X), 1930, 766–79;
reprinted in Ausgewählte Vorträge und Aufsätze, Bern: Francke, 2
vols, 1947–55, 74–97.
42 See Binswanger, ‘Vorwort’, Ausgewählte Vorträge und Aufsätze, vol.
I, 11. The missing paragraph is on Neue Schweizer Rundschau, 676;
and relates to D&E 99/138/83; the English edition proves the text in a
note (103–4 n. 4).
43 These issues are not addressed in the reprint in Binswanger, Introduction
à l’analyse existentielle.
44 Binswanger to Verdeaux and Foucault, 2 March 1955, UAT 443/1206;
FM 194. This is corrected in Introduction à l’analyse existentielle,
224.
45 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 81–2/45; see Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 60.
46 Binswanger to Jacqueline Verdeaux, 6 January 1953, UAT 443/1206.
47 Binswanger, ‘Wahnsinn als lebensgeschichtliches Phänomen und als
Geisteskrankheit (Der Fall Ilse)’, in Schizophrenie, 29–55; ‘Insanity as
Life-Historical Phenomenon and as Mental Disease: The Case of Ilse’,
in May et al. (ed.), Existence, 214–36. Foucault’s translations seem
Notes
not to have survived, but see BNF NAF28730 (38), folder 1 and BNF
NAF28730 (42b), folder 1 for reading notes.
48 Miller, The Passions of Michel Foucault, 73, citing his interview with
Defert, 25 March 1990.
49 Defert misdates the text to 1953 (‘Lettre à Claude Lanzmann’,
Les Temps modernes, 531–532, 1990, 1201–1206, 1204); as does
Foucault, late in life (reported by Williams, DIE 31 n *).
50 Foucault to Binswanger, 27 April [1954], FM 183. See Basso, ‘À
propos d’un cours inédit’, 51–2. Binswanger kept copies of his letters
as well as Foucault’s replies, UAT 443/689; Foucault just Binswanger’s
letters, BNF 28803 (5), folder 1. See FM 183–95.
51 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 8 May 1954, UAT 443/1206.
52 Binswanger to Foucault, 6 May 1954, FM 184–5. A copy of the
typescript of both the translation and the introduction can be found in
Kuhn’s papers: StATG 9’40 3.1.82r1.
53 Binswanger to Foucault, 10 May 1954, FM 186–7.
54 Binswanger to Foucault, 10 May 1954, FM 187–92; Foucault to
Binswanger, 21 May 1954, FM 192–4.
55 Binswanger to Jacqueline Verdeaux, 6 January 1954, UAT 443/1206.
See Ausgewählte Werke, vol. III, 205–30, 71–94 and 179–203. The first
and second were translated by Verdeaux in Introduction à l’analyse
existentielle, 119–47, 49–77; none are in English.
57 Foucault to Binswanger, 27 April [1954], FM 183.
58 Paul Häberlin, Der Mensch: Eine Philosophische Anthropologie,
Zürich: Schweizer Spiegel, 1941. See Paul Häberlin–Ludwig
Binswanger Briefwechsel 1908–1960, Basel: Schwabe, 1997.
59 See Foucault to Binswanger, 27 April [1954], FM 183.
60 See Freud, ‘Psychoanalytic Notes on an Autobiographical Account of
a Case of Paranoia (Dementia Paranoides) (Schreber)’, Case Histories
II, 131–223.
61 Lacan, Le Séminaire Livre I, 112–15; The Seminar of Jacques Lacan
Book I, 68–70.
62 The reference given is to Zur Umarbeitung der VI Logische
Untersuchungen, M III, 2 II 8a (DE#1 I, 77 n. 1; DIE 76 n. 11).
This is the manuscript from 1914 of a revised version of the original
text.
63 For a discussion, see Stuart Elden, ‘Foucault and Shakespeare: The
Theatre of Madness’, in Gotman and Fisher (eds), Foucault’s Theatres,
99–109.
64 Binswanger to Foucault, 10 May 1954, FM 188.
65 See Miller, The Passion of Michel Foucault, 73–5.
66 Pinguet, Le Texte Japon, 52.
67 Archived at the ENS library, S Phi g 3216 A.
69 Jean-Paul Sartre, L’Imaginaire: Psychologie phénoménologique de l’im-
Notes to
Notes
pp. 95–97 233
agination, Paris: Gallimard, 1940; The Imaginary: A Phenomenological

Psychology of the Imagination. trans. Jonathan Webber, London:
Routledge, 2004.
70 Binswanger, ‘Das Raumproblem in der Psychopathologie’. Binswanger’s
text was framed as a sequel to Minkowski’s Lived Time, discussed in
MMPe 61–2; MMPs 61–2/51–2.
71 The works referenced are H. C. Rümke, Zur Phänomenologie und
Klinik des Glücksgefühls, Berlin: Julius Springer, 1924; Eugen Fink,
Vom Wesen des Enthusiasmus, Freiburg: Charnier, 1947.
72 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 84/46–7.
74 Gaston Bachelard, L’Air et les songes: Essai sur l’Imagination du mou-
vement, Paris: José Corti, 1990 [1943]; Air and Dreams: An Essay
on the Imagination of Movement, trans. Edith R. Farrell, Dallas: The
Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, 1983.
75 See, for example, Gaston Bachelard, La Terre et les rêveries du repos,
Paris: José Corti, 1948, 77–8.
77 Bachelard to Foucault, 1 August 1961, reproduced in SP 152–55.
78 René Char, Partage Formel, XXII, in Fureur et mystère, Paris:
Gallimard, 1962 (references are to sections).
79 The references are on DE#1 I, 116, 118, 118, 119; DIE 72, 74, 74,
74; and should be to Char, Partage Formel, XXXIII, XVII (not LV),
XXXVII, LV. The editors and translator of this text correct Foucault’s
erroneous reference and fill in one (DE) or both (DIE) of the missing
ones.
81 Char, Partage Formel, XXII.
82 For the fragment of the manuscript, see BNF NAF28803 (4), folder 1.
84 See, for example, Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 63; Bryan
Smyth, ‘Foucault and Binswanger: Beyond the Dream’, Philosophy
Today, 55 SPEP Supplement, 2011, 92–101, 100 n. 19. Miller, The
Passions of Michel Foucault, 406–7 n. 33 suggests the Binswanger text
is later, but reports Eribon thinks it was earlier. Williams suggests that
it was first, DIE 19.
85 Jean Lacroix to Foucault, 25 February 1953, 1 October 1953, BNF
NAF28803 (5), folder 1. The contract is in folder 3.
86 BNF NAF28803 (5), folder 3.
87 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 24 June 1954, UAT 443/1206.
88 Desclée de Brouwer to Foucault, 14 December 1954, BNF NAF28803
(5), folder 3; Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 5 January 1955;
Binswanger to Verdeaux and Foucault, 2 March 1955, UAT 443/1206;
latter in FM 194–5.
89 Jean Lacroix, ‘La Signification de la folie’, Le Monde, 8 December
1961, 8; revised as ‘La Signification de la folie selon Michel Foucault’,
Notes
Panorama de la philosophie française contemporaine, Paris: PUF,

1966, 208–15, 211.
91 Williams, DIE 19; Miller, The Passions of Michel Foucault, 406–7 n.
33. Though see Defert, ‘Lettre à Claude Lanzmann’, 1204, who says
Foucault refused to have it republished in French.
93 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 5 June 1955, UAT 443/1206.
94 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 61; based on interview with
Georges and Jacqueline Verdeaux.
95 Henri Ey, ‘Rêve et existence (En hommage à E. Minkowski: Réflexions
sur une étude de L. Binswanger’, L’Évolution psychiatrique, 21 (1),
1956, 109–18, 109 n. 1.
96 Robert Misrahi, ‘Le Rêve et l’existence: selon M. Binswanger’, Revue
de métaphysique et de morale 64 (1), 1959, 96–106. Misrahi was one
of the other editors of Spinoza, Œuvres complètes, noted in chapter 3.
A summary of his research was published as Le travail de la liberté, Le
Bord de l’Eau, 2008.
97 Misrahi, ‘Le Rêve et l’existence’, 100.
98 Misrahi, ‘Le Rêve et l’existence’, 102.
99 Misrahi, ‘Le Rêve et l’existence’, 99, 100, 106.
100 Misrahi, ‘Le Rêve et l’existence’, 105–6.
101 See Judith Revel, ‘Sur l’introduction à Binswanger (1954)’, in Luce
Giard (ed.), Michel Foucault: Lire l’œuvre, Grenoble: Jérôme Millon,
1992, 51–6; Jean-Claude Monod, ‘Le Rêve, l’existence, l’histoire.
Foucault, lecteur de Binswanger’, Alter, 5, 1997, 89–99; Philippe
Sabot, ‘L’Expérience, le savoir et l’histoire dans les premiers écrits de
Michel Foucault’, Archives de philosophie, 69 (2), 2006, 285–303,
especially 292–7; and Smyth, ‘Foucault and Binswanger’.
102 The Verdeaux–Binswanger correspondence (UAT 443/1205, 1206)
resolves previous uncertainty about dates. On the second visit: see
i.e. Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 24 June 1954, 31 July 1954;
Binswanger to Jacqueline Verdeaux, 17 August 1954. Foucault men-
tions the first visit in a letter to Binswanger, 27 April 1954, FM 184.
See Basso, FM 176–7.
103 Binswanger to Jacqueline Verdeaux, 15 March 1954, UAT 443/1206.
Foucault, 61–2; FM 13.
105 See also Eribon, Michel Foucault, 42; Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 61–2.
106 The original photographs and flyer are in BNF NAF28803 (5), folder
2.
108 ‘The Asylum and the Carnival’, in Foucault at the Movies, 151; see
‘Paul’s Story’, in Foucault at the Movies, 138.
109 Binswanger to Jacqueline Verdeaux, 22 June 1954; Jacqueline
Notes to
Notes
pp. 99–100 235
Verdeaux to Binswanger, 24 June 1954, UAT 443/1206. The text

was ‘Daseinsanalyse und Psychotherapie’, Ausgewählte Werke, vol.
III, 259–63; ‘Existential Analysis and Psychotherapy’, in Frieda
Fromm-Reichmann and J. L. Moreno (eds), Progress in Psychotherapy
1956, New York: Grune and Stratton, 1956, 144–8. The Foucault
and Verdeaux translation was not published. See, instead, Analyse
existentielle et psychanalyse freudienne, 115–20.
110 Ludwig Binswanger, Le Cas Suzanne Urban: Étude sur la schizo-
phrénie, Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1957.
111 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 27 July 1952, UAT 443/1205.
112 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 10 March 1954, 8 May 1954,
UAT 443/1206.
113 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 2 September 1954, UAT
443/1206.
114 Basso, Michel Foucault e la Daseinsanalyse, 319; ‘Postface’, in
Binswanger, Rêve et existence, 88; FM 178. The same claim is made in
Daniele Lorenzini and Arianna Sforzini, ‘Introduction: L’Histoire de
la folie en œuvre de Foucault’, in Un Demi-siècle d’Histoire de la folie,
Kimé, 2013, 9–34, 12, 31 n. 8.
115 Binswanger, ‘Préface à la traduction française’, Le Cas Suzanne Urban,
11.
116 Foucault to Binswanger, 10 July [1956], FM 195. Jacqueline Verdeaux
had suggested this to Binswanger and given him Foucault’s Uppsala
address, 12 May 1956, UAT 443/1206. The note inside simply says
‘Pour M. Michel Foucault/amicalement/L.B.’ (BEIN 145).
117 Kuhn to Binswanger, undated postcard, c. mid 1955, UAT 443/20.
118 Roland Kuhn, ‘Über die Behandlung depressiver Zustände mit
einem Iminodibenzylderivat (G 22355)’, Schweizerische mediz-
inische Wochenschrift 87 (35/36), 1957, 1135–40; ‘The Treatment
of Depressive States with G22355 (imipramine hydrochloride)’,
American Journal of Psychiatry, 115, 1958, 459–64. See Roland
Kuhn, ‘The Imipramine Story’, in Frank J. Ayd and Barry Blackwell
(eds), Discoveries in Biological Psychiatry, Baltimore: Ayd Medical
Communications, 1984, 205–17; ‘The Discovery of Antidepressants:
From Imipramine to Levoprotiline’, in The Psychopharmacologists II:
Interviews by Dr David Healy, London: Arnold, 1998, 93–118; David
Healy et al. ‘The Imipramine Dossier’, in T. Ban, D. Healy and E. Shorter
(eds), From Neuropsychopharmacology to Psychopharmacology in
the 1980s, Budapest: Animula, 2002, 281–352.
119 See Marietta Meier, Mario König and Magaly Tomay, Testfall
Münsterlingen: Klinische Versuche in der Psychiatrie, 1940–1980,
Zürich: Chronos, 2019.
120 Jean Delay, G. and J. Verdeaux, M. Mordret and A. M. Quétin,
‘Contrôle E. E. G. du traitement par le G 22355 (Tofranil)’, Revue
neurologique 102 (4, 1960, 345–55; see StATG 9’40 5.0.3/19.
121 Binswanger, Introduction à l’analyse existentielle. This has a preface
236 Notes toNotes
pp. 100–102
by Kuhn and Henri Maldiney, and a glossary by Verdeaux and

Kuhn.
122 Binswanger, Introduction à l’analyse existentielle, 199–215.
123 See BNF NAF28730 (83), Entretiens avec Trombadori, 38–9.
124 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 67; see Eribon, Michel Foucault,
85/47. Macey, 67–71 remains a helpful summary of the text.
125 Gros-Azorin, ‘Préface’, in Binswanger, Le Problème de l’espace en
psychopathologie, 7–44, 29–30.
126 Basso, ‘À propos d’un cours inédit’, 40–1.
127 He is briefly mentioned in Antonio Negri, ‘When and How I Read
Foucault’, trans. Kris Klotz, in Nicolae Morar, Thomas Nail and
Daniel W. Smith (eds), Between Deleuze and Foucault, Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press, 2016, 72–83, 73. Negri suggests he began
his engagement with Foucault with his work on Binswanger, von
Weizsäcker and Kant.
128 Gernot Böhme, ‘Rationalising Unethical Medical Research: Taking
Seriously the Case of Viktor von Weizsäcker’, in William R. Lafleuer,
Gernot Böhme and Susumu Shimazono (eds), Dark Medicine:
Rationalizing Unethical Medical Research, Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 2007, 15–29, 18.
129 See Peter Hahn, ‘The Medical Anthropology of Viktor von Weizsäcker
in the Present Clinical Context in Heidelberg’, Anthropologies of
Medicine, 91 (7), 1991, 23–35. More generally, see Raphaël Célis,
‘Responsabilité collective et responsabilité individuelle en matière de
santé: Réflexions inspirées par les écrits socio-médicaux de Viktor von
Weizsäcker’, Ethique et santé, 1 (3), 2004, 144–7; ‘L’Éthique médicale
et clinique de Viktor von Weizsäcker’, Revue Ethique, questions de
vie, January 2007, 1–26 and Hartwig Wiedebach, ‘Some Aspects of a
Medical Anthropology: Pathic Existence and Causality in Viktor von
Weizsäcker’, History of Psychiatry, 20 (3), 2009, 360–76.
130 The only other book of his in French is Pathosophie, trans. Joris de
Bisschop et al., Grenoble: Jérôme Millon, 2011.
131 ‘Travaux et publications des professeurs en 1952–1953’, 151.
132 Declée de Brouwer to Foucault, 8 October 1954, 14 December 1954,
BNF NAF28803 (5), folder 3. A sizable fragment of the translation
typescript is found in BNF NAF28803 (4), folder 4, with other papers
from the early to mid 1950s, before he left for Uppsala.
133 Henri Ey, Études psychiatriques, Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 3 vols,
1950–4; Eugène Minkowski, La Schizophrénie: Psychopathologie des
schizoïdes et des schizophrènes, Paris: Payot, 1927 (reprinted Desclée
de Brouwer, 1954); and Lucien Bonnafé, Henri Ey, Sven Follin, Jacques
Lacan and Julien Rouart, Le Problème de la psychogénèse des névroses
et des psychoses, Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1950; F. Minkowska,
Le Rorschach à la recherché du monde des formes, Paris: Desclée de
Brouwer, 1956.
134 Henri Ey, ‘Préface’, GK–/7–17; an earlier version appeared as ‘A
Notes toNotes
pp. 102–107 237
propos de ‘Cycle de la structure’ de V. von Weizsacker’, L’Évolution

psychiatrique, 2, 1957, 379–89.
135 See Lacan, Écrits, 151–93.
137 Some years later Ey would coordinate a conference on Histoire de la
folie, published as ‘La Conception idéologique de ‘l’histoire de la folie’
de Michel Foucault (Journées annuelles de l’évolution psychiatrique,
Toulouse, 6–7 Décembre 1969)’, L’Évolution psychiatrique, 36 (2),
1971, 223–98.
138 See, for example, Binswanger, ‘Über die daseinsanalytische
Forschungsrichtung’, 240–1; ‘The Existential Analysis School of
Thought’, 198–9.
139 Gros, Ludwig Binswanger, 8.
140 See, for example, Canguilhem, La Formation du concept de réflexe,
167.
141 Kurt Koffka, Principles of Gestalt Psychology, Abingdon: Routledge,
1999 [1935], 176. See also ‘Perception: An Introduction to the
Gestalt-Theorie’, Psychological Bulletin, 19 (10), 1922, 531–85. For
a discussion of the role of Koffka and Gestalt-theory in the intellectual
formation of structuralism, see G. Lanteri-Laura, ‘Généalogie du struc-
turalisme’, L’Évolution psychiatrique, 65 (3), 2000, 477–97.
142 Ey, ‘Préface’, GK–/11.
143 Ey, ‘Préface’, GK–/7,–/10.
144 While Foucault and Rocher translate these as organisme and milieu,
for an unknown reason their diagram puts ‘o’ and ‘a’ in relation.
145 Heidegger, Sein und Zeit, 111 (misreferenced to 11 by both von
Weizsäcker and Foucault and Rocher); Being and Time, 146. Foucault
quotes this, with an accurate reference but different translation in
‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’ [33v].
146 Foucault and Rocher, GK–/44 n. 1,–/122 n. 1.
147 Böhme, ‘Rationalising Unethical Medical Research’, 18.
148 Georg Picht, ‘Macht des Denkens’ in Günther Neske and Emil Kettering
(eds), Erinnerung an Martin, Heidegger, Pfullingen: Neske, 1977,
197–205, 198–9; ‘The Power of Thinking’, in Günther Neske and Emil
Kettering (eds), Martin Heidegger and National Socialism: Questions
and Answers, trans. Lisa Harries, New York: Paragon House, 1990,
161–7, 162–3. See Julian Young, Heidegger, Philosophy, Nazism,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1997, 20.
149 Viktor von Weizsäcker, ‘Ärztliche Aufgaben’, Volk in Werden, 2, 1934,
80–90; reprinted in Gesammelte Schriften 8: Soziale Krankheit und
soziale Gesundung, ed. Dieter Janz and Walter Schindler, Frankfurt
am Main: Suhrkamp, 1986, 143–57.
150 Böhme, ‘Rationalising Unethical Medical Research’, 22; Karl Heinz
Roth, ‘Psychosomatische Medizin und “Euthanasie”: Der Fall Viktor
von Weizsäcker’, 1999: Zeitschrift für Sozialgeschichte des 20. und
21. Jahrhunderts, 86 (1), 1986, 65–99. See the 1933 course ‘Ärtzliche
238 Notes toNotes
pp. 107–110
Fragen: Vorlesungen über allgemeine Therapie’, Gesammelte Schriften

5: Der Arzt und der Kranke Stücke einer medizinische Anthropologie,
ed. Peter Achilles, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1987, 259–342; and
Udo Benzenhöfer, Der Arztphilosoph Viktor von Weizsäcker. Leben
und Werk im Überblick, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht,
2007, 111–16.
151 On this issue generally, see Alexander Mitscherlich, Doctors of Infamy:
The Story of the Nazi Medical Crimes, trans. Heinz Norden, New
York: Henry Schuman, 1949.
152 Böhme, ‘Rationalising Unethical Medical Research’, 18; see Pierre
Baumann, ‘À propos de Viktor von Weizsäcker’, Revue Médicale
Suisse, 21 March 2012, 655.
153 See http://www.uvm.edu/~lkaelber/children/loben/loben.html
154 After the war he published some further reflections on euthanasia,
developing from the doctors’ trials at Nuremberg, and eventually
deciding against the practice. See ‘Euthanasie’ und Menschenversuche,
Heidelberg: Schneider, 1947; part-translated as ‘‘Euthanasia’
and Experiments on Human Beings [Part I: ‘Euthansia’]’, in Karin
Finsterbusch, Armin Lange, and K.F. Diethard Römheld (eds) Human
Sacrifice in Jewish and Christian Tradition, Leiden: Brill, 2007,
277–304.
155 Célis, ‘L’Éthique médicale et clinique’, 23 n. 1.
156 Wiedebach, ‘Some Aspects of a Medical Anthropology’, 361.
157 https://viktor-von-weizsaecker-gesellschaft.de/assets/pdf/Gesammelte-
Werke-prospekt.pdf
158 https://www.viktor-von-weizsaecker-gesellschaft.de/biographie.php?
id=2
159 Wiedebach, ‘Some Aspects of a Medical Anthropology’, 375 n 2.
160 Suzanne Colnort-Bodet, ‘Viktor von Weizsaecker, Le Cycle de la struc-
ture (Der Gestaltkreis)’, Les Études philosophiques, NS 13 (3), 1958,
393.
161 ‘Binswanger et l’analyse existentielle’, [34r]; IMEC FCL 3.8, folder 2,
‘Psychologie de l’enfant’, 12; BNF NAF28730 (43), ‘Hegelei’, Folder 1.

1 ‘Deledalle (Gérard), Histoire de la philosophie américaine’, Moissons
de l’esprit, printemps 1955, 7; reprinted as CH 107.
2 This will be discussed in Elden, The Archaeology of Foucault.
3 Artières et al., CH 107. Gérard Deledalle, Histoire de la philosophie
américaine: De la guerre de sécession à la second guerre mondiale,
preface de Jean Wahl and Roy Wood Sellars, Paris: PUF, 1954, iv.
4 ‘Remarques sur l’enseignement de la phénoménologie’ BNF NAF28803
(3), folder 6.
5 ‘Remarques sur l’enseignement’, 1.
Notes toNotes
pp. 110–113 239
6 ‘Remarques sur l’enseignement’, 2–3.

7 ‘Remarques sur l’enseignement’, 4.
8 Jean Costilles to Foucault, 19 November 1951; J. M. Morfaux to
Foucault, 1 February 1952, BNF NAF28803 (5), folders 1 and 3.
9 ‘Texte sur Merleau-Ponty’, BNF NAF28803 (3), folder 7; Foucault to
Aron, 17 October [1952], FM 122.
10 ‘Texte sur Merleau-Ponty’, 31.
11 ‘Texte sur Merleau-Ponty’, 16. Foucault’s references equate to
La Structure du comportement, 248; Structure of Behaviour, 164;
Phénoménologie de la perception, 57; Phenomenology of Perception,
47.
12 ‘Texte sur Merleau-Ponty’, 15.
13 ‘Texte sur Merleau-Ponty’, 13, 34–5
14 ‘Texte sur Merleau-Ponty’, 37–8.
15 André Baudry to Foucault, 3 February 1954, BNF NAF28803 (5),
folder 3.
17 Miller, The Passions of Michel Foucault, 63.
19 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 71. Nietzsche was present in
a crossed-out part of the Binswanger Introduction manuscript, BNF
NAF28803 (4), folder 2.
20 He appears, for example, in BNF NAF28803 (9), notebooks 6 and 8.
21 Maurice Blanchot, Faux pas, Paris: Gallimard, 1943; Faux pas, trans.
Charlotte Mandall, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001.
22 Maurice Blanchot, La Part du feu, Paris: Gallimard, 1949, 289–301;
The Work of Fire, trans. Charlotte Mandall, Stanford: Stanford
23 Henri de Lubac, Le Drame de l’humanisme athée, Paris: Éditions Spes,
3rd edn, 1945; The Drama of Atheistic Humanism, trans. Edith M.
Riley, London: Sheed and Ward, 1949. Much of Part I is a discussion
of Nietzsche, in relation to Feuerbach and Kierkegaard. Lubac, who
was a Jesuit priest, Catholic cardinal and an influential theologian,
provides a balanced and thoughtful discussion, which appreciates the
political uses of Nietzsche, and discusses his relation to faith in detail.
24 Blanchot, La Part du feu, 292; The Work of Fire, 290. On Nietzsche’s
‘inconsistencies’, see Jaspers, Nietzsche und das Christentum, Hameln:
Fritz Seifert, 1946, 40; Nietzsche and Christianity, trans. E. B. Ashton,
Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1961, 46.
25 Georges Bataille, Sur Nietzsche: Volonté de chance, Paris: Gallimard,
1945; reprinted in Œuvres complètes vol. VI: La somme athéologique
tome II, Paris: Gallimard, 1973; On Nietzsche, trans. Stuart Kendall,
New York: SUNY Press, 2015.
26 Georges Bataille, ‘Nietzsche et les fascistes’, Acéphale 2, 1937, 3–13;
‘Nietzsche and the Fascists’, in Visions of Excess: Selected Writings
1927–1939, ed. Allan Stoekl, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
240 Notes toNotes
pp. 113–114
Press, 1985, 182–96. Foucault’s notes are in BNF NAF28730 (54);

folder 9. The journal was reissued in facsimile: Acéphale: Religion–
Sociologie–Philosophie, Paris: Jean-Michel Place, 1980, introduced
by Michel Camus. On Acéphale, see Encyclopædia Acephalica,
Comprising the Critical Dictionary and Related Texts, ed. Alastair
Brotchie, trans. Iain White, London: Atlas Press, 1995; and The Sacred
Conspiracy: The Internal Papers of the Secret Society of Acéphale and
Lectures to the College of Sociology, London: Atlas Press, 2018.
27 BNF NAF28730 (83), Entretiens avec Trombadori, 18; see C 19/20.
28 Jean-Paul Sartre, ‘Un nouveau mystique’ in Situations I: Essais
Critiques, Paris: Gallimard, 1947, 133–74; ‘A New Mystic’ in Critical
Essays (Situations I), trans. Chris Turner, London: Seagull, 2010.
This was a review of Georges Bataille, L’Expérience intérieure, Paris:
Gallimard, 1943, reprinted in Œuvres complètes vol. V: La Somme
athéologique tome I, Paris: Gallimard, 1973; Inner Experience, trans.
Stuart Kendall, Albany: SUNY Press, 2014.
29 Stuart Kendall, Georges Bataille, London: Reaktion, 2007, 170; see
Surya, Georges Bataille, 331–2.
31 See C 19/19; Eribon, Michel Foucault, 92/52; Miller, The Passions of
Michel Foucault, 66; Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 34–5, 55.
32 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 92/52; Veyne, Foucault, 218/131.
34 Friedrich Nietzsche, Unzeitgemäße Betrachtungen, KSA1, 157–510;
Unfashionable Observations, trans. Richard T. Gray, Stanford:
Stanford University Press, 1995.
35 Frédéric Nietzsche, Considérations inactuelles, trans. Henri Albert,
Paris: Sociéte du Mercure de France, 2 vols, 1907 and 1922.
36 Frédéric Nietzsche, Considérations intempestives III– IV, German–
French edn, trans. Geneviève Bianquis, Paris: Aubier/Montaigne,
1954; Considérations inactuelles I– I I, German–French edition, trans.
Geneviève Bianquis, Paris: Aubier/Montaigne, 1964.
37 Appointment diary 1953, BNF NAF28803 (5), Folder 4.
38 They are especially found in BNF NAF28730 (33b), Folder 4.
39 See, for example, the notes in BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 3; and
DE#84 II, 153, 154, 156; EW II, 386, 387, 388.
40 Karl Jaspers, Nietzsche: Introduction à sa philosophie, trans. Henri
Niel, Paris: Gallimard, 1950; reprinted in the Tel series, 1978.
German and English referenced in chapter 2. See Richard Lowell
Howey, Heidegger and Jaspers on Nietzsche: A Critical Examination
of Heidegger’s and Jaspers’ Interpretations of Nietzsche, The Hague:
Martinus Nijhoff, 1973.
41 Henri Lefebvre, Nietzsche, Paris: Éditions Sociales Internationales,
1939; re-edition Paris: Syllepse, 2003.
42 Pinguet, Le Texte Japon, 56; Louis Pinto, Les Neveux de Zarathoustra:
La Reception de Nietzsche en France, Paris: Seuil, 1995, 136.
Notes toNotes
pp. 114–118 241
43 Jean Wahl, ‘Nietzsche et la mort de Dieu: Note à propos du ‘Nietzsche’

de Jaspers’, Acéphale 1–2, 1937, 22–3.
44 Friedrich Nietzsche, Nietzsches Werke: Großoktavausgabe, Leipzig:
C. G. Naumann and Kröner, 1st edn, 16 vols, 1894–1904; 2nd edn,
19 vols, 1901–13. Richard Oehler, Nietzsche Register: Alphabetisch-
Systematische Übersicht zu Nietzsches Werken nach Begriffen,
Kernsätzen und Namen, Leipzig: Alfred Kröner, 1926 was added as
volume 20. See Jaspers, Nietzsche und das Christentum, 5 n.; Nietzsche
and Christianity, 109.
45 Foucault was involved in the French translation of this edition. See
Elden, The Archaeology of Foucault.
46 Aner Barzilay, ‘Michel Foucault’s First-Philosophy: A Nietzschean
End to Metaphysics in Postwar France, 1952–1984, unpublished PhD
thesis, Yale University, 2019, ch. 3.
47 Karl Jaspers, Nietzsche et le christianisme, trans. Jeanne Hersch, Paris:
Minuit, 1949.
48 Schrift, ‘The Effects of the Agrégation de Philosophie’, 467.
49 Gilles Deleuze, Nietzsche et la philosophie, Paris: PUF, 1962; Nietzsche
and Philosophy, trans. Hugh Tomlinson, New York: Columbia
University Press, 1983.
50 Cahiers de Royaumont Philosophie No. VI: Nietzsche, Paris: Minuit,
1967; DE#46 I, 564–74; EW II, 269–78.
53 BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 3, ‘Commencement, origine, histoire’. A
detailed set of student notes is available at https://cinq-heures-dusoir.
com/2016/11/11/notes-de-cours-foucault-vincennes/
54 Elden, Foucault: The Birth of Power, ch. 1.
55 BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 1, ‘Périr par la connaissance absolue
pourrait faire partie du fondement de l’être’, 11.
56 BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 1, ‘Philosophie et exégèse’.
57 BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 1, ‘Homère et la philologie classique’,
10.
58 BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 1.
59 Friedrich Nietzsche, Die fröhliche Wissenschaft, §7, KSA3, 378–9;
The Gay Science, trans. Walter Kaufmann, New York: Vintage, 1974,
81. See BNF NAF28730 (33b), Folder 4, subfolder 3: ‘L’Histoire’.
61 Nietzsche, Jenseits von Gut und Böse, §39, KSA5, 56–7; Beyond Good
and Evil, 41.
62 BNF NAF28730 (65), Folder 1, 1, 17. See also ‘Connaissance de
l’homme’, page between 63 and 64.
63 Friedrich Nietzsche, Morgenröte, §501, KSA3, 294; Dawn: Thoughts
on the Presumptions of Morality, trans. Brittain Smith, Stanford:
Stanford University Press, 2011, 249, §501.
64 In the original transcript, BNF NAF28730 (83), Entretiens avec
242 Notes toNotes
pp. 118–120
Trombadori, 32, he stresses the importance of Nietzsche’s writings on

the history of truth, texts from the early 1870s (KSA7).
65 Exploring this claim was crucial to my Mapping the Present: Heidegger,
Foucault and the Project of a Spatial History, London: Continuum,
2001; and see also Speaking Against Number: Heidegger, Language
and the Politics of Calculation, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University
Press, 2006.
66 See Veyne, Foucault, 10 n. 2/147 n. 3.
67 They can be found in BNF NAF28803 (3), Folder 1.
68 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 34. Jean-Paul Sartre, L’Être
et le néant: Essai d’ontologie phénoménologique, Paris: Gallimard,
1943; trans. Sarah Richmond, Being and Nothingness: An Essay in
Phenomenological Ontology, London: Routledge, 2018.
69 Martin Heidegger, L’Être et le temps, trans. Rudolf Boehm and
Alphonse de Waelhens, Paris: Gallimard, 1964 (first division only);
Être et temps, trans. François Vezin, Paris: Gallimard, 1986. Vezin
bases the translation on the work of Boehm and de Waelhens, and that
of Jean Lauxerois and Claude Roëls for the second division. The latter
was not published separately.
70 See Camilleri and Proulx, ‘Martin Heidegger– Henry Corbin’, 36–8.
71 Camilleri and Proulx, ‘Martin Heidegger– Henry Corbin’, 40.
72 See also ‘De la nature de la cause (Vom Wesen des Grundes)’, trans.
A. Bessey, Recherches philosophiques, 1, 1931–2, 83–124. On Bifur,
see Catherine Lawton-Lévy, Du Colportage à l’édition: Bifur et les édi-
tions du Carrefour-Pierre Lévy, un éditeur au temps des avant-gardes,
Genève: Metropolis, 2004, 205–8.
73 Heidegger, De l’essence de la verité.
74 Heidegger, Kant et le problème de la métaphysique, trans. Alphonse de
Waehlens and Walter Biemel, Gallimard, Paris, 1953; ‘Introduction’,
9–59.
75 Jean Beaufret, ‘Martin Heidegger et le problème de la vérité’, and
Martin Heidegger, ‘Lettre à Jean Beaufret (Fragment)’, trans. Joseph
Rovan, Fontaine, XI (63), 1947, 758–85 and 786–804. Beaufret’s
text was reprinted in Weber and Huisman, Histoire de la philosophie
européenne II, 353–73.
76 Martin Heidegger, Platons Lehre von der Wahrheit. Mit einem Brief
über den «Humanismus», Bern: A. Francke, 1947; Lettre sur l’hu-
manisme, German-French edition, trans. Roger Munier, Paris: Aubier,
1958; translation reprinted in Questions III et IV, 65–127. (The Plato
essay appears in Questions I et II, 423–69.)
77 Martin Heidegger, Wegmarken (GA9); Pathmarks, ed. William
McNeill, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
78 Four essays were available in Martin Heidegger, Existence and Being,
trans. Werner Brock, London: Vision, 1949. This was the only English
translation until a flurry in the early 1960s.
79 Martin Heidegger, Chemins qui ne mènent nulle part, trans. Wolfgang
Notes toNotes
pp. 120–121 243
Brokmeler, Paris: Gallimard, 1962; Essais et conférences, trans. André

Préau, Paris: Gallimard, 1958. The German texts and the English
Off the Beaten Track were referenced in chapter 2. While most of
the essays have been translated in various collections, Vorträge und
Aufsätze has never appeared in English in complete form.
80 The German and English were referenced in chapter 2. For the French
see Heidegger, Nietzsche, trans. Pierre Klossowski, Paris: Gallimard, 2
vols, 1971.
81 BNF NAF28730 (33a), ‘Heidegger sur Nietzsche’.
82 BNF NAF28730 (33a), Folder 3.
83 Jacqueline Verdeaux to Binswanger, 5 January 1955, UAT 443/1206,
says Wahl gave her a copy of the 1929–30 course, and she asks
Binswanger if he has seen it. Binswanger replies on 10 January to say
no, but that he will see Heidegger at the end of the month and ask him
about it.
84 Alexandre Koyré, ‘Was ist Metaphysik? par Martin Heidegger’, La
Nouvelle Revue française, XXXVI (212), 1931, 750–3; ‘Introduction’,
Bifur 8, 1931, 5–8.
85 Zambelli, Alexande Koyré in incognito, 236.
86 Alexandre Koyré, ‘L’Évolution philosophique de Martin Heidegger,
Critique 1, 1946, 73–82; and 2, 1946, 161–83; reprinted in Koyré,
Études d’histoire de la pensée philosophique, Paris: Armand Colin,
1961, 247–77; ‘Vom Wesen der Wahrheit, par Martin Heidegger’,
Fontaine, IX (52), 1946, 842–4. See Janicaud, Heidegger en France I,
41–2, 92–4.
87 Zambelli, Alexande Koyré in incognito, 235.
88 Emmanuel Lévinas, ‘Alexandre Koyré avait averti les Français: Comme
un consentement à l’horrible’, Le Nouvel Observateur, 22 January
1988, 82–3; see Zambelli, Alexande Koyré in incognito, 235.
89 de Waelhens, La Philosophie de Martin Heidegger, viii, xi. Apparently,
Heidegger did not rate this highly. See the comments of Octavian Vuia,
reported in Mircea Eliade, Journal I: 1945–1955, trans. Mac Linscott
Ricketts, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990, 19–20. On this
work, see Baring, The Young Derrida and French Philosophy, 42–3.
90 Jacques Vuillemin, ‘Nietzsche Aujourd’hui’; L’Héritage kantien et la
revolution copernicienne: Fichte– Cohen– Heidegger, Paris: PUF,
1954.
91 Barzilay, Michel Foucault’s First Philosophy, ch. 4.
92 On this topic generally, see Anson Rabinbach, ‘Heidegger’s Letter on
Humanism as Text and Event’, New German Critique 62, 1994, 3–38;
Janicaud, Heidegger en France I; Kleinberg, Generation Existential,
especially ch. 5; and Pettigrew and Raffoul (eds), French Interpretations
of Heidegger. For an account by another crucial figure in the medi-
ation, see Frédéric de Towarnicki, Martin Heidegger: Souvenirs et
chroniques, Paris: Payot et Rivages, 1999.
93 Aron, Les Modernes, 121–5; Kleinberg, Generation Existential, 201–5.
244 Notes toNotes
pp. 121–123
94 Dennis J. Schmidt, ‘Dominique Janicaud, Heidegger in France’, 7

January 2017, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews, https://ndpr.
nd.edu/news/heidegger-in-france/
95 Janicaud, Heidegger en France I, 150–62 has a detailed discussion.
96 Kostas Axelos, ‘Entretiens du 29 janvier 1998 et du 24 mars 2000’, in
Janicaud, Heidegger en France II, 12–13.
97 Jeanne Hersch, ‘Jean Wahl et Gabriel Marcel’, in Emmanuel Lévinas,
Xavier Tilliette and Paul Ricœur, Jean Wahl et Gabriel Marcel, Paris:
Beauchesne, 1976, 9; see Wahl, Heidegger I, 3; Vers la fin de l’on-
tologie, 5–6. Wahl earlier had a copy of Heidegger’s ‘Letter to the
Rector of Freiburg University, November 4, 1945’, which he circulated
in France. See Geroulanos, An Atheism that is not Humanist, 231.
Heidegger’s text is in Richard Wolin (ed.), The Heidegger Controversy,
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993, 61–6 (GA16, 397–404).
98 Walter Biemel, ‘Entretien du 6 décembre 1999’, in Janicaud, Heidegger
en France II, 42–3.
99 Kleinberg, Generation Existential, 202; Eryck de Rubercy and
Dominique Le Buhan, Douze questions posées à Jean Beaufret à
propos de Martin Heidegger, Paris: Aubier Montagne, 1983, 86–7;
Axelos, ‘Entretiens du 29 janvier 1998 et du 24 mars 2000’, 12.
100 Axelos, ‘Entretiens du 29 janvier 1998 et du 24 mars 2000’, 12.
101 Derrida, ‘Entretiens du 1er juillet et du 22 novembre 1999’, 94–5.
102 Heidegger would return to France several times in the late 1950s (see
de Rubercy and Le Buhan, Douze questions posées à Jean Beaufret,
87); and again for the seminars in Le Thor in 1966, 1968 and 1969.
See also Jean Beaufret, De l’existentialisme à Heidegger: Introduction
aux philosophies de l’existence et autre textes, Paris: J. Vrin, 2000. The
Thor seminars were first published in French in Questions III et IV,
355–488; and then as Seminare (GA15); Four Seminars, trans. Andrew
Mitchell and François Raffoul, Bloomington: Indiana University Press,
2012.
103 Martin Heidegger, ‘Was ist das – die Philosophie?’, GA11, 7–26; trans.
Kostas Axelos and Jean Beaufret as Qu’est-ce que la philosophie?
Paris: Gallimard, 1957; reprinted in Questions I et II, 317–44.
104 Pinguet, Le Texte Japon, 52–3; Jean Wahl, ‘Fragments d’un jour-
nal’, Les Temps modernes 145, 1958, 1709–14. See Beda Allemann,
Hölderlin und Heidegger, Zürich: Atlantic, 1954; Hölderlin et
Heidegger, trans. François Fédier, Paris: PUF, 1959.
106 Daniel Defert, François Ewald, Frédéric Gros, IKA 8/10.
107 Key texts are included as appendices in Heidegger, Kant and the
Problem of Metaphysics (GA3). See Peter Gordon, Continental Divide:
Heidegger, Cassirer, Davos, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 2010.
108 Reported by Friedrich-Wilhelm von Herrmann, GA3, 315; ‘Editor’s
Afterword’, Heidegger, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, 220.
Notes toNotes
pp. 123–124 245
109 Barraqué’s musical works are available as Œuvres complètes, 3 cds,

CDO, 1998. See http://www.musiquefrancaise.net/fiche.php?id=25
For his writings, see Écrits, ed. Laurent Feneyrou, Paris: Publications
de la Sorbonne, 2001. For discussions of his work see the theme issue
of Entretemps 5, 1987; and Musik-Konzepte 82, 1993, as well as G.
W. Hopkins, ‘Jean Barraqué’, Musical Times, November 1966, 952–
55; Adrian Jack, ‘Jean Barraqué’, Music and Musicians, Counterpoint
section 21 (244), 1972, 6–7 (based on an interview with Barraqué);
Bill Hopkins, ‘Barraqué and the Serial Idea’, Proceedings of the Royal
Musical Association, 105, 1978–1979, 13–24; Dominique Jameux,
‘Barraqué, Jean’ in Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell (ed.), The New
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, London: Macmillan, 2001,
vol. II, 179–80. Above all, see André Hodeir, Since Debussy, trans.
Noel Burch, New York: Grove Press, 1961, ch. 8 and Paul Griffiths,
The Sea on Fire: Jean Barraqué, Rochester: University of Rochester
Press, 2003.
110 A brief letter and a note from Foucault to Louis Saguer, 18[?] June 1952
and 20 June [1952], can be found as BNF Musique, VM BOB-31644.
111 Michel Fano, ‘Situation de la musique contemporaine’, Domaine
musical: Bulletin international de musique contemporaine, ed. Pierre
Boulez 1, 1954, 50–66.
112 See Olivier Messiaen in Dossier Jean Barraqué: 1ère partie, Textes
inédits, Collectif musical international de Champigny, 1974, BNF
Musique Vma. 2995, unpaginated.
113 François Nicolas, ‘Le Souci du développement chez Barraqué’,
Entretemps, 5, 1987, 7–24, 9.
114 Jean Barraqué, Debussy, Paris: Seuil, 1962; the Beethoven material is
in Barraqué, Écrits, 393–582. See also ‘La mer de Debussy, ou la nais-
sance des formes ouvertes’, Analyse musicale, 1988, 15–62; reprinted
in Écrits, 277–386.
115 Jack, ‘Jean Barraqué’, 7.
116 For a brief obituary, see Adrian Jack, ‘A Contract with Death’, Music
and Musicians, 22 (2), 1973, 6–7.
117 The correspondence is discussed in Griffiths, The Sea on Fire, ch. 7;
and Eribon, Réflexions sur la question gay, 351–59; Insult and the
Making of the Gay Self, 250–55. See also Eribon, Michel Foucault,
113–18/65–8 (some more details in the French); Macey, The Lives
of Michel Foucault, 50–4; Miller, The Passions of Michel Foucault,
79–81, 84–5 and 89–91. The correspondence is also important to
Lynne Huffer, Mad for Foucault: Rethinking the Foundations of Queer
Theory, New York: Columbia University Press, 2010. For fictional
accounts, see Michael Joyce, Foucault, in Winter, in the Linnaeus
Garden, Buffalo: Starcherone, 2014; Christian-François de Kervran,
Les Dix et une nuits de Jean Barraqué et Michel Foucault à Trélévern,
Paris: Quintes-Feuilles, 2016.
118 Foucault’s handwritten draft of these comments, with some differences,
246 Notes toNotes
pp. 124–125
can be found in BNF NAF28730 (55), Folder 11. See also Foucault’s
1980 discussion of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, directed by Patrice Chéreau
and conducted by Boulez (DE#286 IV, 111–15; EW II, 235–9); and the
1983 dialogue with Boulez (DE#333 IV 488–95; PPC 314–22).
119 Griffiths, The Sea on Fire, 70.
120 Le Temps musical, 23 February 1978, https://manifeste.ircam.fr/play-
lists/le-temps-musical/detail/?fbclid=IwAR2f1ndm nOz3H6Kj _d6ML
Br_DkG8jni_t2MzCPd21tTyZib-7G1WG14dWMM
121 Griffiths, The Sea on Fire, 70; referencing an interview with Boulez.
See also Alain Jaubert, ‘Quelques souvenirs de Pierre Boulez’, Critique
471–2, 1986, 745–7. Joan Peyser, Boulez: Composer, Conductor,
Enigma, London: Cassell, 1977 makes no mention of Foucault, and
only a brief reference to work by Barraqué.
122 See C 18/19; Laurent Feneyrou, ‘Chronologie’, in Barraqué, Écrits, 26.
On the wider context of Barraqué’s engagement with Nietzsche, see
Feneyrou, ‘Introduction’, in Barraqué, Écrits, 18–20.
123 Hermann Broch, Der Tod des Vergil, Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp,
1976 [1945]; The Death of Virgil, trans. Jean Starr Untermeyer,
Oxford: OUP, 1983 [1945].
124 Michel Habart, ‘Hermann Broch et les rançons de la création poétique’,
Critique 83, April 1954, 310–22. Defert suggests it was from Blanchot
(C 20/21). See Blanchot, ‘Broch’, La Nouvelle Revue française, August
1955, 295–301; and ‘courr de Virgile’, La Nouvelle Revue française,
October 1955, 747–59; collected in Le Livre à venir, Paris: Gallimard,
1959, 136–54. See Michèle Lowrie, ‘Blanchot and the Death of
Virgil’, Materiali e discussioni per l’analisi dei testi classici 52, 2004,
211–25.
125 Hermann Broch, La Mort de Virgile, trans. Albert Kohn, Paris:
Gallimard, 1955. On this work’s influence, and Barraqué’s reading of
theory generally, see Patrick Ozzard-Low, ‘Barraqué Broch Heidegger:
A Philosophical Introduction to the Music of Jean Barraqué’, Cahiers
d’études germaniques, 16, 93–106.
126 John A. Hargreaves, Music in the Works of Broch, Mann, and Kafka,
Rochester, NY: Camden House, xiii; and see 91–3.
127 Various outlines are in Barraqué’s notebook and notes, BNF Musique
MS-20148 (1–9). See Rose-Marie Janzen, ‘A Biographical Chronology
of Jean Barraqué’, trans. Adrian Jack, Perspectives of New Music, 27
(1), 1989, 234–45, 240.
128 Hodeir, Since Debussy, 200.
129 Jack, ‘Jean Barraqué’, 6.
130 Jean Barraqué, ‘Propos impromptu’, Courrier musical de France, 26,
1969, 75–80, 78.
131 Among the obituaries, see the set of tributes organized by Raymond
Lyon, ‘Portrait de Jean Barraqué’, Courrier musical de France, 44,
1973, 130–2.
132 The programme can be found as BNF Musique Res Vm dos 40 (31).
Notes toNotes
pp. 125–127 247
The British première was not until 1989 at the Almeida Festival; see
‘Dossier d’artiste, Barraqué (Jean)’, Bibliothèque-musée de l’Opéra.
133 Barraqué, ‘Des goûts et des couleurs. . . et où l’on en discute’, Domaine
musical: Bulletin international de musique contemporaine, ed. Pierre
Boulez 1, 1954, 14–23; reprinted in Écrits, 67–73. The reprint does
not have the reproduction of a letter by Alban Berg, between 16–17.
On this interview, see Griffiths, The Sea on Fire, 72–3.
134 Griffiths, The Sea on Fire, 201.
135 Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, KSA4, 150–51; The
Portable Nietzsche, 229. The French version used was Ainsi parlait
Zarathoustra, trans. Maurice Betz, Paris: Gallimard, 2nd edn, 1936,
119.
136 Cited by Griffiths, The Sea on Fire, 71.

1 Gunnar Broberg, ‘Foucault in Uppsala’, Uppsala Newsletter for the
History of Science, 2 (2), 1985, 7. Based on oral history, this is a heav-
ily edited version of ‘Foucault i Uppsala’, Tvärsnitt 4, 1985, 16–23;
translated as ‘Foucault à Uppsala’, L’Alliance française d’Upsal 1891–
1991, Uppsala: Alliance française, 1991, 71–84. See also Jean Piel,
‘Foucault à Uppsala, témoignages rassemblés par Jean Piel’, Critique
471–2, 1986, 748–52.
2 Georges Dumézil, ‘Un Homme heureux’, Le Nouvel Observateur,
29 June 1984, 42; Dumézil, Entretiens avec Didier Eribon, Paris:
Gallimard, 1987, 214. See also Eribon, Faut-il brûler Dumézil?
Mythologie, science et politique, Paris: Flammarion, 1992, 113–14.
The only letter from Curiel to Foucault in the archive is from Kabul on
7 January 1954, BNF NAF288803 (5), Folder 1.
3 Dumézil to Foucault, 15 October 1954 in Eribon, Michel Foucault et
ses contemporains, 110–11.
4 Reported in Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 112, from
the copy given to him by Dumézil.
5 Sabot, ‘The ‘World’ of Michel Foucault’, 2. One piece of evidence is
a letter from Foucault to Jean-Paul Aron, 6 October 1954, cited by
Sabot, 16 n. 28.
6 Foucault to Dumézil, 22 October 1954; in Eribon, Michel Foucault et
ses contemporains, 111.
7 Foucault to Barraqué, 29 August 1955, in Eribon, Michel Foucault et
8 Paul Falk to Foucault, 3 March 1955, BNF NAF28803 (5), Folder 1.
9 Dumézil, ‘Un Homme heureux’; Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses
contemporains, 113–14, 114 n. 3. See three letters from Dumézil to
Foucault, February–June 1955, and an unsent letter from Foucault to
Dumézil, 12 March 1955, BNF NAF28803 (5), Folder 1.
248 Notes toNotes
pp. 127–129
10 Dumézil, Entretiens, 214; Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 77.

There must have been a subsequent visit, possibly when Dumézil was
given an honorary doctorate, as a copy of his Déesses latins et mythes
védiques, Bruxelles: Latomus, 1956, was dedicated to Foucault on 22
October 1956 in Uppsala (BEIN 604).
11 I.e. Foucault to Dumézil, 18 June [1959], DMZ 75.25; 29 May [1957],
Archives Didier Eribon.
12 Dumézil, Entretiens, 215–16.
13 Dumézil, Entretiens, 217; see Eribon, Faut-il brûler Dumézil? 279–80.
14 Göran Hammarström, Memories of a Linguist 1940–2010, München:
Lincom Europa, 2012, 6. The comment is about Pierre Letellier initially,
suggesting that Foucault and other successors were similar. Much of
Hammarström’s account here reprints his earlier essay ‘Foucault in
Uppsala’, AUMLA 83, 1995, 87–91.
15 Hammarström, Memories of a Linguist, 24, 75; Falk to Foucault, 3
March 1955.
16 See also teaching records relating to the Alliance française in NC 1874.
17 Uppsala Universitets Katalog: Höstterminen 1955, vol. I, 63. On his
teaching, see also Piel, ‘Foucault à Uppsala’, 749.
18 Uppsala Universitets Katalog: Vårterminen 1956, vol. I, 66.
19 Uppsala Universitets Katalog: Höstterminen 1956, vol. I, 73.
20 Uppsala Universitets Katalog: Vårterminen 1957, vol. I, 75–6.
21 Macey, Michel Foucault, 51, dates this to 1958 and suggests the course
was never delivered, but the 1957 listing indicates that it probably was.
23 Uppsala Universitets Katalog: Vårterminen 1958, vol. I, 81.
25 Broberg, ‘Foucault in Uppsala’, 7; Dumézil, Entretiens, 214.
26 Hammarström, Memories of a Linguist, 75.
27 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 74; based on interview with
Denys Foucault, 21 September 1990.
28 NC 1874, Alliance française comité d’Upsal, Statuts, Articles I and II.
29 An undated clipping is preserved in NC 1874, Elsa Norström, Journal
de la section des jeunes de l’alliance française d’Upsal 1953–, 9; see
Eribon, Michel Foucault, 137/79.
30 NC 1874, Elsa Norström, Journal, 9.
32 Dumézil, Entretiens, 215; see Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault,
77.
33 Sten-Gunnar Hellström, ‘Section des jeunes: Chronique de deux décen-
nies heureuses’, in L’Alliance française d’Upsal, 57–69, 59–60; Eribon,
Michel Foucault, 138/79–80.
34 NC 1874, Elsa Norström, scrapbook 1952–1959; C 21/23; Piel,
‘Foucault à Uppsala’, 751; Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 77;
Artières et al., LMD 10/viii. See Pierre Vesperini, ‘‹‹Un gentil mécréant,
avec qui l’on entre aussitôt dans le seul monde qui compte»: Cinq
Notes toNotes
pp. 129–132 249
lettres du père Festugière à Michel Foucault (1956–1957)’, Anabases,

31, 2020, 125–30.
35 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 81–2. On the Foucault–Barthes
relation, see Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, Part II, Ch.
6; and Marie Gil, Roland Barthes: Au lieu de la vie, Paris: Flammarion,
2012, especially 218–22.
36 Tiphaine Samoyault, Barthes: A Biography, trans. Andrew Brown,
Cambridge: Polity, 2016, 432.
37 C 21/22; Hyppolite, Figures de la pensée philosophique, vol. I, 196–
208; vol. II, 973–86. An undated postcard of thanks from Foucault to
Hyppolite’s secretary can be found as HYP IV/7/15/1.
38 Ronald Aronson, Camus and Sartre: The Story of a Friendship and the
Quarrel that Ended it, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004,
211.
39 Pal Ahluwalia, Out of Africa: Post-Structuralism’s Colonial Roots,
London: Routledge, 2010, 145–6.
41 Dumézil, ‘Un Homme heureux’, 42.
42 The titles of the lectures have been taken from multiple issues of
Svenska Dagbladet, between 19 October 1955 and 13 March 1957.
They were generally listed in the ‘För dagen’ daily events, as well as in
an advertisement later in the paper.
44 BNF NAF28730 (42a), Folder 2; BNF NAF28730 (54), folder 10.
45 See Kostas Axelos, Einführung in ein künftiges Denken: Über Marx
und Heidegger, Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 1966, 104; Introduction
to a Future Way of Thought: On Marx and Heidegger, trans. Kenneth
Mills, ed. Stuart Elden, Lüneborg: Meson, 2015, 176.
46 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 596 n. 7/–, see 130/–, and Michel Foucault et
47 D-6-a-FOU, ‘IV: Die französische Anthropologie’, Fonds Jean Bollack,
Archives littéraires suisses. See Sender Freies Berlin, 1957–1958,
Berlin: Sender Freies Berlin, [1960].
48 Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Le Phénomène humain, Paris: Seuil, 1955;
The Phenomenon of Man, trans. Bernard Wall, London: Collins, 1959.
49 ‘IV: Die französische Anthropologie’, 13–14.
50 ‘IV: Die französische Anthropologie’, 16.
51 Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 134.
52 Dumézil, Entretiens, 217.
53 Tönnes Kleberg, ‘Preface’, in Hans Sallander, Bibliotheca Walleriana:
The Books Illustrating the History of Medicine and Science Collected
by Dr Erik Waller and Bequeathed to the Library of the Royal
University of Uppsala– A Catalogue Compiled by Hans Sallander,
Stockholm: Almquist and Wiksell, 2 vols, 1955, vol. I, ix.
54 Kleberg, ‘Preface’, ix.
55 See also Hans Fredrik Sallander, ‘The Bibliotheca Walleriana in the
250 Notes toNotes
pp. 132–134
Uppsala University Library’, Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och biblioteks-

väsen 38, 1951, 49–74; and Emil Starkenstein, ‘Der Arzt und sein
Buch: Dem Arzte und Bücherfreunde Dr Erik Waller gewidmet von
. . .’, Philobiblon, 10, 1938, 305–34.
56 Foucault to Winifred Barbara Maher and Brendan Maher, 10 December
1980, cited in Winifred Barbara Maher and Brendan Maher, ‘The Ship
of Fools: Stultifera Navis or Ignis Fatuus?’ The American Psychologist,
37 (7), 1982, 756–61, 759.
58 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 78; see 94.
59 It is also notable that Foucault only lists the historical texts utilized;
there are no bibliographical entries for the more philosophical or liter-
ary material explored in the book, especially in its late chapters.
60 Foucault’s reading notes for this book, in BNF NAF28730 (34a–b) and
(35a–b), also include material from later dates, including the 1970s,
and some clearly relate to the work for Birth of the Clinic, for which
notes are also in BNF NAF28730 (36). Some of the notes relate to a
planned project on the demonic, which Foucault promised in History
of Madness (HM 39 n. 1/597 n. 83). Some of Foucault’s work in the
1960s indicated the possible contours of this project, including a text
on ‘Médecins, juges et sorciers au XVIIe siècle’ (DE#62 I, 753–67) and
an unpublished typescript labelled as ‘Chapitre I: Le démoniaque et
l’imaginaire’ in BNF NAF28730 (57), Folder 2. A discussion will be
in The Archaeology of Foucault. This theme continued to haunt him
at least until The Abnormals course in 1974–5. See Elden, Foucault’s
Last Decade, chs. 1 and 3.
61 Broberg, ‘Foucault i Uppsala’, 20–1; Piel, ‘Foucault à Uppsala’, 749–50.
63 Dumézil, Entretiens, 218. Foucault’s most sustained reflections on
writing as a practice can be found in SBD.
65 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 61; see Eribon, Michel Foucault,
110–11/64, 145/83.
67 IMEC LTR 67.1, Dossier Verdeaux et Foucault. The first page of each
is reproduced in SP 42–3. A fragment of a draft typescript is repro-
duced as SP 44–5.
68 See Patrick Louis, La Table Ronde: Une aventure singulière, Paris: La
Table Ronde, 1993; Marie-Gabrielle Slama, ‘La Table Ronde’ in Pascal
Fouché, Daniel Péchoin, Phillipe Schuwer (eds), Dictionnaire ency-
clopédique du Livre, Cercle du Librarie, 2011, 3 vols, vol. III, 804–5;
Guillaume Gros, ‘Rolland Laudenback et La Table Ronde, Jacques
Perret et Aspects de la France’, in Michel Leymarie, Olivier Dard and
Jean Yves Guérin (eds), L’Action française. Culture, société, politique
vol. IV: Maurrassisme et literature, Paris: Presses Universitaires du
Septentrion, 2012, 219–32.
Notes toNotes
pp. 134–139 251
69 See, for example, DE#140 II, 647; ‘Film, History and Popular Memory’,
in Foucault at the Movies, 104.
70 On this, see particularly, Louis, La Table Ronde, ch. V.
71 The letter can be found as ‘Annexe 1’ in only the second edition of
Eribon, Michel Foucault, Paris: Flammarion, 1991, 356–7; and part
in SP 46–7. See Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 120–1.
Foucault does not provide a year, but the context makes it clear it was
1956. A letter from Père Festugière to Foucault, 10 February 1957, in
Vesperini, ‘Un gentil mécréant’, 129–30, indicates that Foucault was
developing this work on madness in dialogue with classical sources.
72 Sten Hjalmar Lindroth, Paracelsismen i Sverige till 1600–talets mitt,
Uppsala: Almqvist and Wiksell, 1943.
73 Broberg, ‘Foucault i Uppsala’, 21.
74 Sten Lindroth, ‘Erik Wallers bibliotek’, in J. Viktor Johansson (ed.),
Svenska Bibliotek, Stockholm: Wahlström and Widstrand, 1946,
159–216.
75 Sten Lindroth to Erik Waller, 3 March 1947, Waller Ms Wall-00890,
Uppsala special collections.
76 Foucault to Dumézil, 29 May [1957], part-cited in Eribon, Michel
Foucault, 147/–.
78 Foucault to Sten Lindroth, 10 August 1957, Uppsala special collections;
reproduced in SP 78–81; cited in Eribon, Michel Foucault, 148–9/84.
80 Broberg, ‘Foucault in Uppsala’, 7; see ‘Foucault i Uppsala’, 22. Sten
Lindroth, A History of Uppsala University, 1477–1977, trans. Neil
Tomkinson, Uppsala: Uppsala University, 1976, has no reference to
Foucault. This is symptomatic of a general survey of trends and institu-
tional history: in the post-war period there are no scholars mentioned.
On the general intellectual context, see Tore Frängsmyr, ‘History of
Science in Sweden’, Isis, 74 (4), 1983, 464–8.
82 Broberg, ‘Foucault i Uppsala’, 17–18. This is supported by corre-
spondence with Dumézil on 14 September [1958]. See Eribon, Michel
Foucault et ses contemporains, 123, and for the initial description of
the role see Paul Falk to Dumézil, 11 October 1954 (Eribon, 109); Falk
to Foucault, 3 March 1955.
85 Johan Bergström, ‘Resa i förstummat Sverige’, Svenska Dagbladet, 2
August 1993, 24.
87 Hammarström, ‘Foucault in Uppsala’, 90.
88 Barou, ‘Il aurait pu aussi bien m’arriver tout autre chose’, 4.
89 IMEC LTR 67.1, Dossier Verdeaux et Foucault.
90 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 61; see 78–9.
252 Notes toNotes
pp. 139–140
91 Foucault made an oblique reference to Dumézil’s ‘homosexual freema-

sonry’ circle of contacts, reported in Mauriac, Le Temps accompli, 51.
Dumézil was a freemason; as well as married with two children. See
Eribon, Faut-il brûler Dumézil? 172; and Michel Foucault et ses con-
temporains, 125 and n. 3, which suggests homosexuality was crucial to
their friendship, but that it never went beyond this. Foucault describes
friendship as a ‘sort of secret freemasonry’ in a 1978 interview with
Moriaki Watanabe (DE#234 III, 589).
92 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 149/85. Eribon only calls him ‘Professor
Hasselroth’, but it seems highly likely that this is Bengt Hasselrot,
a specialist on old French and a docent in Romance languages at
Uppsala. On Hasselrot, see Hammarström, Memories of a Linguist,
78–81. Hasselrot was an opponent of Hammarström’s doctoral thesis
in 1953.
93 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 144/83; see 150/85; Piel, ‘Foucault à
Uppsala’, 750; Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 73–4.
84. See http://www.okf.uw.edu.pl/fr/. Names of the Centre differ in
various reports.
95 Following the transcript, BNF NAF28730 (83), Entretiens avec
Trombadori, 7. The publication says 1958 (DE#281 IV, 45; EW III,
243).
96 Foucault to unnamed friend, 22 November 1958, quoted in C 22/24.
The line about Poland is the opening stage direction of the play, which
Foucault echoes in a 1962 review in Critique: ‘The scene is set in
Poland, that is everywhere’ (DE#11 I, 215; EW II, 53). Even before he
arrived, Foucault wrote to Dumézil on 28 September 1958, saying that
‘in eight days I will be on the other side of the bars’ (quoted in Eribon,
Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 123).
97 Foucault to Dumézil, 16 November 1958, in Eribon, Michel Foucault,
154/–.
98 Remigiusz Ryziński, Foucault w Warszawie, Warszawa: Dowody na
Istnienie, 2017. An excerpt was translated by Sean Gasper Bye as
https://www.wordswithoutborders.org/article/june-2018-queer-issue-
ix-foucault-in-warsaw-remigiusz-ryziski-sean-bye. For discussions, see
Maya Szymanowska, ‘«Foucault à Varsovie», l’histoire d’un philoso-
phe homosexuel dans la Pologne des années 50’, Le Soir, 27 August
2017, and Piotr Sobolczyk, ‘Foucault: Madness and Surveillance in
Warsaw’, Foucault Studies, 25, 2018, 174–90.
99 Anna Krakus and Cristina Vatulescu, ‘Foucault in Poland: A Silent
Archive’, Diacritics, 47 (2), 2019, 76.
100 The Warsaw lecture is briefly mentioned in Zdzisław Rylko, ‘Apollinaire
na Uniwersytecie Warszawskim’, Przegląd Humanistyczny, 3 (2),
1959, 197–201, 201.
101 BNF NAF28730 (54), folder 10, ‘Apollinaire’. Some notes on theatre,
mainly prior to the twentieth century, are in the same folder. There
Notes toNotes
pp. 141–146 253
appears to be nothing else in the archives relating to his time in Poland.

See Ryziński, Foucault w Warszawie, 171.
102 See Eribon, Michel Foucault, 153–54/88; Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 85–6; C 23/25; Artières et al., LMD, 9/viii; Sobolczyk,
‘Foucault’, 178–9.
103 Ryziński, Foucault w Warszawie, 86.
105 Jeannette Colombel, Michel Foucault: La Clarté de la mort, Paris:
Odile Jacob, 1994, 12.
106 Michel Foucault, ‘Du pouvoir’, in Bernard Pivot (ed.), Écrire, lire et en
parler, Paris: Robert Laffont, 1985, 355–63, 356; PPC 98.
108 Ryziński, Foucault w Warszawie, 93–4.
109 See Étienne Buran des Roziers, ‘Une Recontre à Varsovie’, Le Débat,
41, 1986, 132–6; as well as Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault,
85–6; Eribon, Michel Foucault, 155–6/88–9.
110 Buran des Roziers, ‘Une Rencontre à Varsovie’, 136; Eribon, Michel
Foucault, 156/89.
113 Krakus and Vatulescu, ‘Foucault in Poland’, 85 report a rumour that
he was actually an established translator and poet.
114 Macey interview with Defert, November 1989, Macey, Michel
Foucault, 54; The Lives of Michel Foucault, 86–7. The reference is
reproduced in Eribon, Michel Foucault, 156/89.
115 Macey interview with Defert, November 1989; see Kamil Julian, ‘In
Search of Michel Foucault’s Polish Lover’, Dik Fagazine, 8, 2011,
134–43, 136; Sobolczyk, ‘Foucault’, 181.
116 Krakus and Vatulescu, ‘Foucault in Poland’, 73.
117 Julian, ‘In Search of Michel Foucault’s Polish Lover’, 138.
118 Ryziński, Foucault w Warszawie, 89. Krakus and Vatulescu, ‘Foucault
in Poland’, 79, note that the ability of the SB to bug was extremely
limited, but that diplomatic missions and some hotels were targeted,
drawing on Antoni Dudek and Andrzej Paczkowski, ‘Poland’, in
Krzysztof Persak and Łukasz Kamiński (eds), A Handbook of the
Communist Security Apparatus in East Central Europe, 1944–1989,
Warsaw: Institute of National Remembrance, 2005, 221–83, 248–9.
119 The file is reproduced in Ryziński, Foucault w Warszawie, 79–80.
120 Ryziński, Foucault w Warszawie, 103–5.
122 I have discussed this book before in Mapping the Present, 120–33. For
one remarkable rereading, see Huffer, Mad for Foucault.
124 This is especially in the chapter ‘The Birth of the Asylum’ (HM
483–530/463–511).
125 Foucault anticipates another study of the nineteenth-century e xperience
254 Notes toNotes
pp. 146–149
of madness (HM 541/522), which he would never complete. On his

subsequent work on madness, see The Archaeology of Foucault, and
Foucault: The Birth of Power, ch. 4.
126 BNF NAF28730 (42a), Folder 1.
128 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 113. See Maurice Blanchot,
‘Sade’, Lautréamont et Sade, Paris: Minuit, 1949, 217–65; ‘Sade’s
Reason’, Lautréamont et Sade, trans. Stuart Kendall and Michelle
Kendall, Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004, 7–41.
129 Blaise Pascal, Pensées, #31, in Pensées, opuscules et lettres, ed. Philippe
Sellier, Paris: Garnier, 2010, 167; in Pensées and Other Writings,
trans. Honor Levi, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995, 9. Eribon,
Michel Foucault, 161/92.
7 Hamburg, Kant
1 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 156–7/89; Foucault to Dumézil, 18 June
[1959], DMZ 75.25.
2 See Dix années d’Institut Français: mélanges pour le dixième anniver-
saire de l’Institut Français de Hambourg, Hamburg, 1962, held at the
Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Hamburg.
3 ‘Hamburger Rundblick’, Hamburger Abendblatt, 10–11 October
1959, 4; G. Deshusses to Kulturbehörde, 22 October 1958; Ahrens to
Kulturbehörde, 15 October 1959, StAHbg 363–6 II, 1828, 48, 58.
4 ‘Ein Hauch Pariser Luft’, Hamburger Abendblatt, 1 October 1959, 11;
‘Französisch-Deutsche Woche in Hamburg’, Hamburger Abendblatt, 2
October 1959, 11.
5 Defert, Œ I, xliv; see Eribon, Michel Foucault, 158/90. Defert’s previ-
ous timeline had the contact with Hyppolite in December 1957, and
with Canguilhem over Christmas 1958, both of which are much too
early (C 21–2/23–4).
6 Hyppolite, Figures de la pensée philosophique, vol. II, 885–90.
7 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 104. See Canguilhem, ‘Qu’est-ce
que la psychologie?’, Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 63 (1),
1958, 12–25; reprinted in Études d’histoire et de philosophie des
sciences, Paris: Vrin, 1983 [1968], 365–81; trans. Howard Davies as
‘What is Psychology?’, Ideology and Consciousness 7, 1980, 37–50. It
was reprinted in Cahiers pour l’analyse 2 (1), 1966, 77–91, and read
in a quite different context, shaped by the reception of Foucault’s work
and the rise of anti-psychiatry. For a discussion, see Elden, Canguilhem,
ch. 5.
8 Élisabeth Roudinesco, Philosophy in Turbulent Times, trans. William
McCuaig, New York: Columbia University Press, 2008, 25–6.
9 Georges Canguilhem, ‘Rapport de M. Canguilhem sur le manuscrit
déposé par M. Foucault, directeur de l’Institut Français de Hambourg,
Notes toNotes
pp. 149–150 255
en vue de l’obtention du permis d’imprimer comme these principale

de doctorat ès lettres’ in Eribon, Michel Foucault, 541–547/–, 541/–;
‘Report from Mr. Canguilhem on the Manuscript Filed by Mr. Michel
Foucault, Director of the Institut Français of Hamburg, in Order
to Obtain Permission to Print his Principal Thesis for the Doctor of
Letters’, trans. Ann Hobart, in Arnold I. Davidson (ed.), Foucault and
his Interlocutors, Chicago: University of Chicago, 1996, 23–7, 23. See
Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 93.
11 Canguilhem, ‘Ouverture’, in Penser la folie: Essais sur Michel Foucault,
Paris: Galilée, 1992, 39–42, 39; ‘Introduction to Penser la folie: Essais
sur Michel Foucault’, trans. Ann Hobart, in Davidson (ed.), Foucault
and his Interlocutors, 33–5, 33.
12 Canguilhem, ‘Sur l’Histoire de la folie en tant qu’événement’, Le Débat,
41, 1986, 37–40, 38; ‘On Histoire de la folie as an Event’, trans. Ann
Hobart, in Davidson (ed.), Foucault and his Interlocutors, 28–32, 30.
13 Foucault to Hyppolite, 27 April [1960], HYP IV/7/15/2. See Macey,
The Lives of Michel Foucault, 88–9; C 23/25.
14 Rainer Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg: Anmerkungen zum einjäh-
rigen Aufenthalt 1959/60’, Zeitschrift des Vereins für Hamburgische
Geschichte 102, 2016, 71–112, 90–1; part-translated by Melissa
Pawelski, Theory, Culture and Society, https://journals.sagepub.com/
doi/10.1177/0263276420950457. See also Eribon, Michel Foucault,
156–9/89–90; Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 87–9.
15 Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 90–1.
16 Universität Hamburg: Personal- und Vorlesungsverzeichnis,
Sommersemester 1960, 52.
Wintersemester 1959/60, 131–2; Sommersemester 1960, 148–9;
Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 92. At the Institut Français, Hell
taught a class on modern French theatre, which Foucault would also
have been well-suited to take over. See Institut Français Hambourg,
Sommersemester 1959, Kursusprogramme, in StAHbg 363–6 II, 1828.
18 Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 93; citing an unpublished manu-
script by Schmidt-Radefeldt.
19 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Rousseau juge de Jean-Jaques: Dialogues,
Paris: A. Colin, 1962. Foucault’s Introduction is reprinted as DE#7 I,
172–88; EW II, 33–51.
20 As reported by Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 94–5.
21 ‘Wir notieren kurz’, Hamburger Abendblatt, 10 May 1960, 7;
Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 98; Programme des Manifestations
de l’Institut Français en 1960, StAHbg 363–6 II, 1828.
Wintersemester 1960/61, 149–50; Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’,
108–9 n. 149; Ahrens to Kulturbehörde, 7 October 1960, StAHbg
363–6 II, 1828, 62.
256 Notes toNotes
pp. 150–152
23 ‘Wir Notieren Kurz’, Hamburger Abendblatt, 27 June 1960, 7;

Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 95; Programme des Manifestations.
24 See StAHbg 363–6 II, 1828, especially 57, 60, and Programme des
Manifestations.
25 Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 89; citing StAHbg 364–5 I,
K.20.1.138, 19.
26 Programme des Manifestations. Savi must have been popular, as he
had given a talk on a related topic on 23 October 1959, see StAHbg
363–6 II, 1828, 58.
27 While this specific lecture was unpublished, his major critical work
treats related themes: Pour un nouveau roman, Paris: Gallimard,
1963; For A New Novel: Essays on Fiction, trans. Richard Howard,
Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1989 [1965].
28 Alain Robbe-Grillet, Ghosts in the Mirror, trans. Jo Levy, London:
John Calder, 1988, 132–3.
29 Alain Robbe-Grillet, Dans le labyrinthe, Paris: Minuit, 1959; In the
Labyrinth, trans. Christine Brooke-Rose, London: Calder, 1967.
30 Defert and Ewald, DE#343 IV, 600 n.*. This copy is archived as BEIN
852.
31 See David Meakin, ‘Introduction’, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Dans le laby-
rinthe, ed. David Meakin, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983.
32 Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 95; C 23/25; Eribon, Michel
Foucault, 157–8/90.
33 Programme des Manifestations; Defert and Ewald, DE#12 I, 229;
Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’, 105.
34 ‘Wächter über die Nacht der Menschen’, in Unterwegs mit Rolf
Italiaander: Begegüngen und Betrachtüngen, Hamburg: Freie Akademie
der Künste, 1963, 46–9; DE#12 I, 229–32 is a translation back into
French. Italiaander’s tribute was published as ‘Michel Foucaults Sorge
um die Zunkunft des Menschen’, Die Welt, 9 July 1984, 19; reprinted
in his Besinnung auf Werte: Persönlichkeiten in Hamburg nach dem
Krieg, Hamburg: Johannes Asmus, 1984, 300–10.
35 Defert, Œ I, xliv.
36 Pierre Gascar, ‘La Nuit de Sankt-Pauli’, in Portraits et souvenirs,
Paris: Gallimard, 1991, 63–93; C 23/25–6; Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in
Hamburg’, 98, 100; Claude Mauriac, Le Temps immobile 6: Le Rire
des pères dans les yeux des enfants, Paris: Grasset, 1988 [1981], 197.
37 Italiaander, Besinning auf Werte, 305–6.
38 Italiaander, Besinning auf Werte, 306, 307.
39 Italiaander, Besinning auf Werte, 300–1; see Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in
Hamburg’, 102–3.
40 Emmanuel Kant, Anthropologie, trans. Joseph Tissot, Paris: Librairie
Philosophique de Ladrange, 1863; trans. Pierre Jalabert in Œuvres
philosophiques III, Paris: Gallimard, 1986, 939–1144; Anthropologie
du point de vue pragmatique, trans. Alain Renault, Paris: Flammarion,
1993.
Notes toNotes
pp. 152–154 257
41 Immanuel Kant, Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View, trans.

Mary J. Gregor, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1974.
42 Foucault, ‘Notice historique’, in Emmanuel Kant, Anthropologie du
point de vue pragmatique, Paris: Vrin, 1964, 7–10; reprinted as DE#19
I, 288–93.
43 See Kant’s note to APPV 122. The lectures are in Akademie Ausgabe,
vol. XXVI; the edited version in vol. IX; translated in Natural Science,
ed. Eric Watkins, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012,
434–679. See Stuart Elden and Eduardo Mendieta (eds), Reading
Kant’s Geography, Albany: SUNY Press, 2011. Foucault only briefly
mentions the relation of the Anthropology to the Geography (IKA
19–20/32–3).
44 Foucault references Immanuel Kants Menschenkunde oder
Philosophische Anthropologie and Kants Anweisung zur Menschen-
und Weltkenntnis, both ed. Friedrich Christian Starke, Leipzig, 1831,
reprinted in one volume, Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1976. For a partial
English translation, see Immanuel Kant, Lectures on Anthropology,
ed. Allen W. Wood and Robert B. Louden, Cambridge: Cambridge
45 Defert et al., IKA, 7/9; Immanuel Kants Werke, ed. Ernst Cassirer,
Berlin: Bruno Cassirer, 11 vols, 1912–23.
46 ‘Note on the Text and Translation’, Anthropology from a Pragmatic
Point of View, ed. Robert B. Louden, Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2006, xxxvi–ix. A full critical edition is in Anthropology, History
and Education, ed. Günter Zöller and Robert B. Louden, Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2007.
47 See also Defert et al., IKA 7/9, where they indicate this is uncertain.
Derek Robbins thinks it even sparked the work, but provides no evi-
dence. French Post-War Social Theory, London: Sage, 2012, 80.
48 BNF NAF28730 (41), unnumbered folder.
49 On the challenge of situating the Anthropology in relation to the
Critiques see also IKA 75/118.
50 The more elaborate title is suggested in C 23/25; Eribon, Michel
Foucault, 187/–; Márcio Alves da Fonseca and Salma Tannus Muchail,
‘La thèse complémentaire dans la trajectoire de Foucault’, Rue
Descartes 75, 2012, 21–33, 21. Archival copies consulted were in the
Sorbonne library RRA 4=207; CAPHÉS CAN 3939; HYP IV/5/17/1;
BNF NAF28730 (41), folder 2a; and IMEC D60r [FCL12], a photo-
copy of the Sorbonne version. The Sorbonne text (used as the basis for
the publication) and Canguilhem and Hyppolite’s copies are simply
titled ‘Introduction à l’Anthropologie de Kant’; the title with which it
was published as IKA. The BNF copy is missing the opening two pages
but has some hand-written corrections which were not used in the
published text.
51 Parts are available as Lectures on Anthropology. See Werner Stark,
‘Historical Notes and Interpretative Questions about Kant’s Lectures
258 Notes toNotes
pp. 156–166
on Anthropology’, in Brian Jacobs and Patrick Kain (eds), Essays on

Kant’s Anthropology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003,
15–37.
52 Note that Kant uses the adjective psychologisches in this passage,
which Foucault renders as psychologique (APPV 142).
53 On phenomena and power see IKA 44–5/71–2.
54 Edmund Burke, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas
of the Sublime and Beautiful, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2014.
55 For a reading of the Introduction in the light of the anthropology
course, see Vaccarino Bremner, ‘Anthropology as Critique’. For a val-
uable discussion see Robert B. Louden, ‘Foucault’s Kant’, Journal of
Value Inquiry, 2020, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10790-020-09754–1
56 Heidegger, GA3, xvi; Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, xix; see
210/147.
57 Heidegger, GA3, 205; Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, 144.
58 Manfred Kuehn, ‘Introduction’, in Kant, Anthropology, ed. Louden,
xii.
59 Heidegger, GA3, 208; Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, 146.
60 i.e. Heidegger, GA3, 213; Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, 149.
61 See i.e., Heidegger, Kant et le problème de la métaphysique, 262.
62 Nietzsche, Jenseits von Gut und Böse, §210, KSA5, 144; Beyond Good
and Evil, 114.
63 Dumézil, Entretiens, 217.
64 Canguilhem, Dumézil and Hyppolite are invoked as mentors in
Foucault’s inaugural lecture at the Collège de France (OD 73–4/169–70).
65 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 174–5/102; based on an interview with
Canguilhem, and clarified in a letter from Eribon to Canguilhem, 8
March 1988, CAPHÉS GC 33.7.7.

1 Canguilhem, ‘Rapport’, 541; ‘Report’, 23. The original is in CAPHÉS
GC 19.4.8. Canguilhem took some encouragement to allow its pub-
lication. On 6 July 1988 Canguilhem gave François Ewald a copy of
the typescript for the Centre Michel Foucault archive, saying he would
allow consultation, but not reproduction (note on IMEC D231). Ewald
replied that he will respect this, but it is a great shame as it is one of
best things written on the History of Madness (François Ewald to
Canguilhem, 4 August 1988, with a 5 August postscript, CAPHÉS GC
19.4.8). It first appeared in the second edition of Eribon’s biography.
2 Canguilhem, ‘Rapport’, 543; ‘Report’, 24.
3 Canguilhem, ‘Rapport’, 546; ‘Report’, 26.
4 Canguilhem, ‘Rapport’, 547; ‘Report’, 26–7.
Notes toNotes
pp. 167–169 259
5 Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 106–8; Claude Lévi-Strauss,

Anthropologie structurale, Paris: Plon, 1958. Many years later, on
being told of Foucault’s rejection too, Lévi-Strauss admitted this was a
consolation. Claude Lévi-Strauss and Didier Eribon, De près et de loin
suivi de «Deux ans après», Paris: Odile Jacob, 1990, 102.
6 Philippe Ariès, Un Historien du dimanche, Paris: Seuil, 1980, 145.
7 Philippe Ariès, L’Enfant et la vie familiale sous l’ancien régime, Paris:
Plon, 1960; Centuries of Childhood, trans. Robert Baldick, London:
Pimlico, 1996 [1962].
8 Ariès, Un Historien du dimanche, 145; see Roger Chartier, ‘Les
Chemins de l’histoire’, Le Nouvel Observateur, 29 June 1984, 44.
9 On this process, see also Patricia Sorel, Plon: Le Sens de l’histoire
(1833–1962), Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2016, 265–6.
Foucault would publish ‘The Battle for Chastity’ in a collection edited
by Ariès in 1980 (DE#312 IV, 295–308; EW I, 185–97), and when
Ariès died in 1984, just a few months before Foucault himself, Foucault
wrote a short tribute for Le Nouvel Observateur (DE#347 IV, 646–9)
and he and Arlette Farge discussed his influence in Le Matin (DE#348
IV, 649–55).
10 The cover is reproduced in SP 89; Peter Harrington books allowed me
to consult a copy.
11 Foucault to Marcel Jullian, 7 November 1970, SP 118–20. See Eribon,
Michel Foucault, 122. This information is missing from the third edi-
tion of Eribon; see the first and second on 147.
12 Eribon, Michel Foucault 185/109; Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 111.
13 Defert, ‘Dossier soutenance de thèses’, BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder
1a, loose sheet.
14 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 2b, ‘Int à l’anth de Kant’, 1.
15 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 2b, 2.
16 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 2b, 8–9.
17 Quoted in Eribon, Michel Foucault, 187/110; see BNF NAF28730
(41), Folder 2b, 5.
18 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 1a, 1. The reference is likely to Erwin H.
Ackerknecht, A Short History of Psychiatry, trans. Sulammith Wolff,
New York: Hafner, 1959; and A Short of History of Medicine, New
York: The Ronald Press Company, 1955.
19 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 1a, 10.
20 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 1a, 12v.
21 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 1a, 20.
22 BNF NAF28730 (41), Folder 1a, 21.
23 Aron, Les Modernes, 216–17; also quoted in Eribon, Michel Foucault,
184/108. Eribon reports that he is drawing on the notes taken by
Gouhier at the defence, now in his possession.
24 Eribon, Michel Foucault 190/111.
25 Canguilhem, ‘Rapport’, 543–4; ‘Report’, 24–5.
260 Notes toNotes
pp. 169–172
26 Reported in Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 111–12; Eribon,

Michel Foucault 190–6/112–13 (considerably more detail in the French
third edition).
27 Aron, Les Modernes, 216.
28 The report is reproduced in SP 98–101; and Eribon, Michel Foucault,
197–9/113–15.
29 There are some hand-written corrections to Hyppolite’s copy, HYP
IV/5/17/2, which Foucault seems to have largely followed in the pub-
lished version.
30 Hyppolite’s rough notes on the two parts of the secondary thesis are
preserved as HYP IV/5/17/3–5.
31 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 199/115; Macey, The Lives of Michel
Foucault, 112.
32 Marc Ragon, ‘King Cang’, Libération, 4 February 1993, 19–21, 20.
33 BNF NAF28803 (14), Folder 1 contains some of Foucault’s notes and
marks for this.
34 See Foucault to Hyppolite, 27 April [1960]; Hyppolite to Foucault, 9
May 1960, enclosing a copy of the letter sent to the secretariat at the
Sorbonne, HYP IV/7/15/2–4.
35 Université de Clermont-Ferrand, Livret de l’étudiant, 1960–1, 323; C
23/25. Canguilhem would continue to act as a supporter of Foucault’s
career throughout his life.
36 Cited in Eribon, Michel Foucault, 226–7/129.
37 Université de Clermont-Ferrand, Livret de l’étudiant, 1962–3, 22; C
24/27.
38 See Eribon, Michel Foucault, Annexes 3 and 4, 557–77/– (not in
English translation); and Elden, Foucault: The Birth of Power, 11.
See also Jules Vuillemin, ‘Nécrologie: Michel Foucault (15 octobre
1926–25 juin 1984)’, Annuaire du Collège de France 85, 1984–1985,
73–5.
39 This copy is archived as IMEC BP ALT B272/4.
40 Bachelard to Foucault, 1 August 1961, SP 152–55.
41 BNF NAF28730 (83), Entretiens avec Trombadori, 40–1.
42 See ‘Radio France III, Heure de culture française, Michel Foucault:
Histoire de la folie’, BNF NAF28294 Fonds Jean Grenier, Œuvres,
Articles et Conférences de Jean Grenier, Carton IV.
43 ‘Raison et Folie: Analyse spectrale de l’Occident’, https://www.ina.fr/
audio/PHZ04018895
44 The reviews by Barthes, Mandrou, and Blanchot, and the second part
of Serres’s essay are reprinted in Philippe Artières et al. (eds), Histoire
de la folie à l’âge classique de Michel Foucault: Regards critiques
1961–2011, Caen: Presses universitaires de Caen, 2011, 35–108. See
Barthes, ‘Taking Sides’, in Critical Essays, trans. Richard Howard,
Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1972, 163–70. For the
others, see Henry Amer, ‘Michel Foucault, Histoire de la folie à l’âge
classique (Plon)’, in La Nouvelle Revue française, September 1961,
Notes toNotes
pp. 172–174 261
530–2; Octave Mannoni in Les Temps modernes, December 1961,

802–5; Michel Serres, ‘Géométrie de la Folie’, Mercure de France
1188, 1962, 682–96; 1189, 1962, 63–81; reprinted in Hermès I: La
communication, Paris: Minuit, 1968, 167–90; ‘The Geometry of the
Incommunicable: Madness’, trans. Felicia McCarren, in Davidson
(ed.), Foucault and his Interlocutors, 36–56. On the Amer–Blanchot
exchange, and these initial reviews generally, see Macey, The Lives
of Michel Foucault, 115–19. More recently, see Philippe Chevallier
and Tim Greacen (eds), Folie et justice: relire Foucault, Toulous: Érès,
2009 and Lorenzini and Sforzini (eds), Un Demi-siècle d’histoire de la
folie.
45 Lacroix, ‘La Signification de la folie’.
46 ‘The Story of Unreason’, The Times Literary Supplement, 6 October
1961, 663–4.
47 Foucault, ‘Du pouvoir’, 356; PPC 97.
48 In DE, this opening paragraph (and a description of Foucault’s demean-
our) is omitted. In FL the opening sentence is dropped, and the rest is
turned into a question. See ‘“La Folie n’existe que dans une société”’,
Le Monde, 22 July 1961, 9.
49 Georges Dumézil, Mythe et épopée III: Histoires romaines, Paris:
Gallimard, 1973, 14; ‘Entretien sur les mariages, la sexualité et les trois
fonctions, chez les indo-européens’, Ornicar? 19, 1979, 69–95, 78.
50 Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains, 247; see Part II, Ch.
1; Faut-il brûler Dumézil? 333–4. Perhaps the best indication of this
notion of structure can be found in Foucault’s remarks reported in
André Malan, ‘Colloque de Saclay’, in A. Lichnerowicz et al. (eds),
Structure et dynamique des systèmes, Paris: Maloine, 1976, 165–90,
177–8; see LMD 121–2/76–7.
51 Georges Dumezil, L’Héritage indo-européen à Rome, Paris: Gallimard,
1949, 43.
52 C 24/27; François Delaporte in Œ I, 1526–7; see Foucault to Dumézil,
[30 September 1961] in Eribon, Michel Foucault et ses contemporains,
164–5.
53 This was Foucault’s comment about Jacques Almira bringing him the
manuscript of his novel Le Voyage à Naucratis (Paris: Gallimard,
1975). The copy Almira gave Foucault is archived as BEIN 13. See
Almira, ‘La reconnaissance d’un écrivain’, Le Débat, 41, 1986, 159–63.
54 Eribon, Michel Foucault, 260/152; Macey interview with Canguilhem,
1990.
55 Arianna Sforzini, Les Scènes de la vérité: Michel Foucault et le théâtre,
Lormont: Le Bord de l’eau, 2017, 72 says Raymond Roussel appeared
‘just a few days later’. See Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 129.
56 BNF NAF28803 (5), folder 3, contract, 30 March 1953, Article 9.
57 Some of the changes in the first part are helpfully outlined in Bernauer,
Michel Foucault’s Force of Flight, 42–6, 185–7; and there is excellent
analysis in Macherey, ‘Aux sources de “l’Histoire de la folie”’; Gutting,
262 Notes toNotes
pp. 175–185
Michel Foucault’s Archaeology of Scientific Reason, 56–9, 64–9; and

Dreyfus, ‘Foreword to the California Edition’. See also Miller, The
Passions of Michel Foucault, 403–4 n. 82.
58 See also Macey, The Lives of Michel Foucault, 64.
59 The actual title of the second part, according to its heading and the
contents page, is ‘Madness and Culture’ (MMPs 71/59; 106/v).
60 For some changes see François Delaporte’s notes to Œ I, 1528–52;
and Bernauer, Michel Foucault’s Force of Flight, 188–92. As The
Archaeology of Foucault will discuss, the revisions are much more
extensive, and the English translation is a peculiar blend of the editions.
61 A footnote criticizing the neo-Jacksonism of Henri Ey (MMPe 33 n. 1)
is removed from the second edition.
62 However, according to Defert, Foucault did not read La Formation du
concept de réflexe until 1964 (C 25/29), and Canguilhem’s book only
briefly mentions Pavlov.
63 Gutting, Michel Foucault’s Archaeology of Scientific Reason, 68–9
suggests a ‘third major difference’ when Foucault removes ‘existential
anthropology’ from his list of ‘mythical explanations’ (MMPe 89).
But while Foucault amends this passage in the revision, ‘existential
anthropology’ is not omitted (MMPs 101/84–5).
65 It first appeared in the Quadrige series in 1995, and has been reprinted
several times.
68 The English translation in EW II omits a clause of the French here.
69 Eribon, Réflexions sur la question gay, 570 n. 637; Insult and the
Making of the Gay Self, 394 n. 16.
70 On the dating, see Elden, Foucault’s Last Decade, 166, 228 n. 4.
71 Presses Universitaires de France to Georges Canguilhem, 16 July 1986,
CAPHÉS GC 33.7.7.
72 Presses Universitaires de France to University of California Press,
16 July 1986, CAPHÉS GC 33.7.7. There certainly was a 1966 edi-
tion; but not a 1969 one. The 1966 edition is reviewed by P. Huard,
‘Médecine mentale et psychologie’, Revue de synthèse, 88 (45–6), 1967,
94–5.
73 Michel Foucault, Madness: The Invention of an Idea, trans. Alan
Sheridan, New York: Harper Perennial, 2011.
74 Foucault to Marcel Jullian, 7 November 1970, SP 118–20; see Eribon,
Michel Foucault, 217/–.
75 Georges Kiejman to Foucault, 7 November 1970, reused as notepaper
in BNF NAF28730 (66), Folder 1.
76 On 8 September 1972, Foucault was interviewed about this new edi-
tion by Georges Charbonnier for RTF, ‘Michel Foucault à propos de
son livre Histoire de la folie’, http://www.ina.fr/audio/P14100090
77 Foucault to Jullian, 7 November 1970, SP 118.
Notes toNotes
pp. 185–192 263
78 The 10/18 version was itself reprinted in 1972, subsequently replaced

by the 1976 Gallimard version in the Tel series.
79 FD2 105/117 compare HM 269/249; FD2 154/159 compare HM
327/297.
80 Mauriac, Le Temps immobile 3, 403.
81 Before the complete 2005 English translation, another chapter was
translated: ‘Experiences of Madness’, trans. Anthony Pugh, History of
the Human Sciences 4 (1), 1991, 1–25.
82 Colin Gordon, ‘Histoire de la folie: An Unknown Book by Michel
Foucault’, History of the Human Sciences, 3 (1), 1990, 3–26. That
issue and 3 (3) contained several responses to Gordon’s claims, and
a reply. Most of these are collected in Arthur Still and Irving Velody
(eds), Rewriting the History of Madness: Studies in Foucault’s Histoire
de la Folie, London, Routledge, 1992. Gordon’s piece shaped my
approach in Mapping the Present, ch. 5.
83 Hacking, in HM –/x, –/xi.
84 The footnote on Nietzsche’s Zarathustra (FD1 620 n. 1) is missing
from the French in 1972 and 1976, but is restored to the English
translation (HM [537]/642–3 n. 8).
85 The 10/18 cover only has the title Histoire de la folie, but the title page
has the longer, original version. On this, see Hacking, in HM –/ix–x.
Coda: Towards Archaeology

1 ‘Alexandre Koyré: La Révolution astronomique: Copernic, Kepler,
Borelli’, La Nouvelle Revue française, 108, 1 December 1961, 1123–4.
References are to DE.
2 FD1, inside cover. I have followed the translation by Pawelski in
Nicolaysen, ‘Foucault in Hamburg’. See also DE#281 IV, 59; EW III,
258.
3 Jacques Bellefroid, ‘Jean-Paul Aron, Michel Foucault et Cie’, Cahiers de
la difference, 3, 1988, 3–10, 7.
Index
À la Recherche du temps perdu L’Anglais tel qu’on le parle (Bernard),

(Proust), 130 129
absolute knowledge, 13, 15, 117 angst, 38, 81, 84–5
abstraction, 17, 33, 63, 64–5, 77 Animadversiones (Leibniz), 8
Académie française, 28 animal experimentation, 47, 76
Acéphale, 112–13, 114 Annales, 172
Action française, 134 anorexia, 37, 70, 93
Adventures of the Dialectic (Merleau- Anouilh, Jean, 129, 130, 134
Ponty), 23 Anthropologie für Ärtze und
Aeneid (Virgil), 62 Weltweise (Platner), 32
aesthetics, 39, 125 Anthropologie Structurale (Lévi-
affective memory, 25 Strauss), 167
Ages d’intelligence, Les (Brunschvicq), anthropology, 20, 32–5, 37, 46,
25 54–5, 71–2, 83–4, 89–90, 94,
agrégation, 7, 22, 24–7, 28, 110, 115, 98, 101, 108, 131, 152–65, 168,
191 170, 192; see also philosophical
Ajuriaguerra, Julian, 7, 17 anthropology
Akavia, Naamah, 38 Anthropology (Kant), 6, 16, 33, 111,
Albert, Henri, 113–14 123, 149, 152–65, 168, 170
Albert-Sorel, Jean, 129 Antigone (Anouilh), 134
alchemy, 58, 144 anti-Semitism, 8
Algeria, 134 Antoine, André, 130, 131
alienation, 32, 34, 72–3, 76, 77, 78, anxiety, 63, 68, 84
94, 156, 179, 180 Anzieu, Didier, 77
Allemann, Beda, 122 Apollinaire, Guillaume, 140, 141,
Alliance française (Uppsala), 126, 129 150
Althusser, Louis, 6, 7, 11, 24, 25, 27, ‘Apollinaire et l’art moderne’
30, 36, 62, 79, 171 (Foucault), 150
Amer, Henri, 172 Aquinas, Thomas, 72
Anaximander, 120 Arcadie: Revue Littéraire et
Andromaque (Racine), 128, 144, 172 scientifique, 111
266 Index
archaeology, use of term, 40, 42, 66, Baudelaire, Charles, 44, 46, 150
153, 173 Bayle, Pierre, 28
Archaeology of Foucault, The (Elden), Beaufret, Jean, 7, 8, 9, 10, 36, 44, 53,
1, 5, 21, 116, 164, 171, 174, 190 119, 121–2
Archaeology of Knowledge, The Becker, Oskar, 40, 95
(Foucault), 1, 5, 16, 26, 146, Beckett, Samuel, 31, 130
174, 190 Beethoven, Ludwig van, 123
Archives Nationales, 4 behaviourism, 17–18, 23, 54
Arguments series, 100 Being and Nothingness (Sartre), 103
Ariès, Philippe, 167 Being and Time (Heidegger), 8, 9, 21,
Aristotle, 8, 25, 95 34, 38, 82–3, 85, 87, 90, 118,
Arnaud, Piere, 143 120, 162
Arnauld, Antoine, 95 being-in-the-world, 42, 87, 106
Aron, Jean-Paul, 29, 45, 53, 111, 168, Bellefroid, Jacques, 192
169 Bellevue Sanatorium, 36, 37–8
Aron, Raymond, 11, 150 Belval, Yvon, 29
art, 23, 39, 120, 124, 140, 145–6, Benassy, Maurice, 31
150–1, 164, 169, 170, 177, 179, Benedict, Ruth, 45, 71
190 Benjamin, Walter, 168
Artaud, Antonin, 145, 146, 179, 181 Benserade, Isaac de, 95
Astronomical Revolution, The Berger, Gaston, 62
(Koyré), 10, 189–90 Bergson, Henri, 8, 25, 103
asylums, 50, 143–5, 146, 177–8, 186, Bergström, Johan, 137–8
191; see also hospitals Berkeley, George, 25
Aubenque, Pierre, 27 Bernanos, Georges, 128, 130
Auschwitz-Birkenau, 141 Bernard, Claude, 27, 54
Ausgewählte Vorträge und Aufsätze Bernard, Tristan, 129
(Heidegger), 87 Berne, 16
authenticity, 38, 93 Beyond Good and Evil (Nietzsche),
autism, 44 34, 117
Avenarius, Richard, 41 ‘Beyond the Pleasure Principle’
Axelos, Kostas, 9, 100, 122, 131 (Freud), 19, 46, 54
Bianquis, Geneviève, 113–14
Bachelard, Gaston, 25–6, 41, 43, 56, Bibliotheca Walleriana, 132, 135, 174
80, 95–6, 131, 171–2, 190 Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, 4
Badiou, Alain, 11, 50 Bibliothèque du Saulchoir, 4
Baillarger, Jules, 44 Bibliothèque historique de la ville de
Balzac, Honoré de, 3, 72–3 Paris, 4
Bamberger, Jean-Pierre, 29 Bibliothèque Nationale de France
Baring, Edward, 83 (BNF), 1, 4, 12, 31, 34, 40, 51,
Barou, Jean-Pierre, 1 140
Barraqué, Jean, 6, 123–5, 127 Bibliothèque Sainte-Geneviève, 4
Barthes, Roland, 124, 129–30, 150, Bicêtre, 72, 77, 144
168, 172 Bichat, Xavier, 54
Baruk, Henri, 172 Biemel, Walter, 10, 119
Barzilay, Aner, 115 Bifur, 83, 121
Basso, Elisabetta, 36, 37, 99, 101 Binet, Alfred, 57
Bastide, Georges, 171 Binswanger, Ludwig, 20, 29, 31, 33,
Bastille archives, 4 35–41, 44, 55, 69, 70–1, 77–8,
Bataille, Georges, 3, 11, 112–13, 114, 80–101, 108, 112, 116, 124–5,
121, 146 146, 172, 191
Index 267
Foucault and Verdeaux’s Brod, Max, 1

translation, 2, 6, 20–1, 37, 39, Bruce, Jean, 150
68, 71, 81–8, 97–8, 100 Brunner, Emil, 33
Foucault’s introduction, 2, 6, 20–1, Brunschvicq, Léon, 25
39, 40, 43, 46, 51, 53–4, 56, Brussels, 29
88–98, 100–1, 113, 116 Bulletin de psychologie, 23
Foucault’s notes, 2, 81–3, 85–6, Buran des Roziers, Étienne, 141, 142
100 Burke, Edmund, 160
Foucault’s unpublished manuscript Burlingham, Dorothy, 45
on, 35–40, 43, 51, 88, 89, 108, Burloud, Albert, 56–7
191 Butor, Michel, 150
Binswanger, Ludwig (grandfather of Bykov, Konstantin Michaelovich, 76,
the above), 36 79
Binswanger, Otto, 36
Binswanger, Robert, 36 Cahiers du Sud, 113
biology, 21, 34, 39, 57, 59, 103, 104, Cahn, Théophile, 131
190 Caillois, Roger, 113, 167
Biran, Maine de, 8, 28, 32 Caillois, Roland, 77
Birault, Henri, 10 Caligula (Camus), 150
Birth of the Clinic (Foucault), 1, 5, Camilleri, Sylvin, 119
144, 145, 173–4, 176, 182, 183 Camus, Albert, 130, 149–50
Birth of Tragedy, The (Nietzsche), 34 Canguilhem, Georges, 6, 11, 12,
Blanchot, Maurice, 4, 11, 112, 146, 24–9, 55–6, 95, 102, 108, 148–9,
167, 172 165–9, 171, 174, 181, 184
Bleuler, Eugen, 36, 39, 64, 77 Cantique des cantiques, Le
Bloch, Ernst, 168 (Giraudoux), 129
Blondel, Charles, 39, 44, 54 Caractère et personnalité (Berger), 62
Blumenbach, Johann Friedrich, 32 carnival, 99
Bochner, Ruth, 80 Carolina Rediviva library, 4, 126,
body, the, 22, 23, 38, 70, 84, 178 132–3, 135, 138
Böhme, Gernot, 107 Cartesian Meditations (Husserl), 16,
Bollack, Jean, 131 42, 43, 80
Bonnefoy, Claude, 133 Cassirer, Ernst, 40, 123
Bosch, Hieronymus, 179 Cassou, Jean, 140
Boss, Medard, 37, 40 causality, 21, 45, 70
Boulez, Pierre, 123, 124, 125 Cavaillès, Jean, 8, 26, 27
Bourdieu, Pierre, 8, 28–9, 30 Centre de civilisation française
Bourilly, Jean, 140, 141 (Warsaw), 139–40
Boutang, Yann Moulier, 30 Centre Nationale de la Recherche
Boutroux, Émile, 25, 71 Scientifique, 170
Bouvard and Pécuchet (Flaubert), 3 Centre Nationale d’Orientation, 47–8
Braque, Georges, 122 Cerisy-la-Salle conference, 121–2
Braudel, Fernand, 172 Cézanne, Paul, 150
Brazil, 1, 116 Char, René, 94, 96, 122, 130, 140,
Breslau, 101, 107–8 150, 186
Brentano, Franz, 41 Chateaubriand, François-René de,
Breton, André, 4, 11 128
Brissago, 98 chemistry, 57, 58
Broberg, Gunnar, 136 Chevalier, Maurice, 129
Broca, Paul, 32 child development, 44, 45, 66
Broch, Hermann, 124 child psychology, 43, 44, 66
268 Index
Child’s Conception of Space, The Critique of Pure Reason (Kant), 33,

(Piaget and Inhelder), 45 153, 154, 160, 161, 162, 168
Christianity, 72; see also religion Critique of the Foundations of
Cicero, 25, 95 Psychology (Politzer), 17–18
Clarté, 3 Croce, Benedetto, 16
Claudel, Paul, 130 cruelty, 117, 178
Clermont-Ferrand, 6, 26, 29, 31, 47, Curiel, Raoul, 126
50, 150, 171 Cyrano de Bergerac, Savinien de, 95
Clinical Application of the Rorschach
Test (Bochner and Halpern), 80 Dans le labyrinthe (Robbe-Grillet),
Cocteau, Jean, 95, 129, 150 151
cogito, 13 Darwin, Charles, 67
‘Cogito and the History of Madness’ Dasein, 10, 34, 42, 82–5, 87, 90,
(Derrida), 9 105–6, 119, 162
cognitive faculties, 155, 157–8 Daseinsanalysis, 6, 36–9, 55, 78, 80,
collective psychology, 54 83–4, 89, 91, 94, 182
Collège de France, 5, 11–12, 17, 23, ‘Daseinsanalytical School of Thought
32, 43, 111, 116, 127, 133, 151, in Psychiatry, The’ (Binswanger),
171, 190, 192 37, 80
Colombel, Jeanette, 141 Davos disputation, 123
Colonie, La (Marivaux), 150 Davy, Georges, 27
Comédie humaine, La (Balzac), 72–3 Daybreak (Nietzsche), 34, 117
‘Commencement, Origine, Histoire’ de Lubac, Henri, 112
(Foucault), 116 de Viau, Théophile, 95
communism, 3, 8, 17, 24, 27, 78–9, de Waelhens, Alphonse, 21, 83, 119,
134, 139 121
compulsive behaviours, 63, 65 death, 37–8, 50, 70, 74, 93, 134, 163,
Comte, Auguste, 8, 24–5 177
conflict, 67, 74–7, 181 Death and the Labyrinth (Foucault),
‘Connaissance de l’homme et réflexion 173–4
transcendantale’ (Foucault), death-drive, 74
32–5 Death of Virgil, The (Broch), 124
consciousness, 13, 14–15, 17, 21, 22, Debussy, Claude, 123
42, 59–60 deconstruction, 106
‘Contemporary French Theatre’ defence mechanisms, 67–8, 74, 76
(Foucault), 128, 130 Defert, Daniel, 4, 5, 9, 18, 28–9,
Cooper, David, 101 31–2, 36, 42, 88, 97, 116, 122–3,
Copeau, Jacques, 130 141–2, 149, 151, 164, 168, 170,
Corbin, Henry, 34, 83, 119, 120 173–4
Costilles, Jean, 110 Delay, Jean, 31, 39, 47, 48, 49, 167,
criminality, 48, 71, 144, 177, 190 172
Crise de la psychologie Delcroix, Jean-Loup, 131
contemporaine, La (Politzer), 17 Deledalle, Gérard, 109
Crisis of European Sciences, The Deleuze, Gilles, 29, 115, 122, 124
(Husserl), 42, 43 delusions, 74, 156
Critique (journal), 3–4, 77, 121, 124, dementia praecox, 63–4
172 depression, 27, 37, 47, 63, 100, 134
Critique of Judgement (Kant), 33, Derrida, Jacques, 8, 9, 30–1, 42, 43,
153, 154, 161, 168 83, 106, 122, 154, 171, 185
Critique of Practical Reason (Kant), Des chercheurs français s’interrogent
25, 33, 153, 154, 161, 168 (Morère), 53, 57–62, 127
Index 269
Desanti, Jean-Toussaint, 7, 8, 112 Education of the Human Race

Descartes, René, 3, 8, 13, 15, 22, (Lessing), 33
25, 30, 33, 143, 146, 169, 186, ‘Ego and the Id, The’ (Freud), 19
189 ‘Ego in Freud’s Theory and in the
Desclée de Brouwer, 81, 102 Technique of Psychoanalysis’
detachment, 66, 69, 70 (Lacan), 19
developmental psychology, 54 Eigenwelt, 38–9, 70, 87, 105
Dewey, John, 109 ‘Eighteenth-Century Political
Dialogues avec Heidegger (Beaufret), Thought’ (Foucault), 149
8 Einleitung in die Philosophie
Diderot, Denis, 150, 169 (Heidegger), 9, 10, 120–1
Dilthey, Wilhelm, 33, 54 electroencephlography, 47, 48
discipline, 146 electroshock treatment, 39, 77
dispositif, 180 elements, 26, 95, 131
Dits et écrits (Foucault), 2, 54, 56, 57, Elements of the Philosophy of Right
58, 109, 151 (Hegel), 16
Doat, Jean, 99 L’Encéphale, 80
Domaine musical, 123, 125 Encyclopaedia (Hegel), 16
Don Juan (Molière), 128 Encyclopaedia Britannica, 53
Dora case study (Freud), 19, 45 L’Enfant et la vie familiale sous
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor, 150 l’ancien régime (Ariès), 167
Drama of Atheistic Humanism, The Engels, Friedrich, 78
(de Lubac), 112 Enlightenment, 33, 54
‘Dream and Existence’ (Binswanger), L’Enseignement philosophique, 110
37, 39, 71, 81–98, 100–1, 116, epilepsy, 47, 71
125 epistemology, 26, 162, 163; see also
dreams, 38, 69, 71, 84–5, 88–9, 91–4, knowledge
116, 186 Erasmus, 135, 169, 186
Dreyfus, Dina, 11 Eribon, Didier, 3, 4, 28–30, 47, 53,
Dreyfus, Hubert, 184 78–9, 124, 127, 132–3, 135, 141,
Driesch, Hans, 103 149, 165, 169, 173, 182–3
‘Droit, Le’ (Althusser), 24 Erinnerungen an Sigmund Freud
drugs see medication (Binswanger), 100
drunkenness, 116 Espinas, Alfred, 45
dualism, 33 esprit, 155–7
Duhamel, Colette, 134, 135, 172 Esprit (journal), 77, 172
Duhamel, Georges, 28 Esquirol, Jean-Étienne, 44
Duhamel, Jacques, 135 ‘Essence of Ground, The’ (Heidegger),
Dumézil, Georges, 5, 6, 126, 127, 119
129–33, 135, 139, 146, 148, 164, ‘Essence of Truth, The’ (Heidegger),
172–3 40, 119
Dupré, Ernest, 63 L’État de siège (Camus), 150
Duras, Marguerite, 129 eternal return, 35, 162
Durkheim, Émile, 46, 71, 131 L’Eternel retour (Cocteau), 129
eternity, 25, 39
L’École des veuves (Cocteau), 150 euthanasia, 107
École Normale Supérieure (ENS), 4, evolution, 45, 54, 65–8, 71, 73–4, 75,
7–27, 30–2, 35, 42–5, 47, 62, 81, 78, 180, 181
89, 102, 122, 171, 190–1 ‘Evolution and Dissolution of the
Écrits (Lacan), 17, 18, 19 Nervous System’ (Jackson),
education, 58, 59, 73–4, 110 65–6
270 Index
L’Évolution psychiatrique, 98 Foucault, Michel

Ewald, François, 122 agrégation, 7, 22, 24–7, 28, 191
exclusion, 71, 72–3, 143–4, 172–3, childhood reading, 3
177–8 in Clermont-Ferrand, 6, 29, 31, 47,
existential psychotherapy, 20, 29, 36, 50, 150, 171
80, 100–1 Collège de France candidacy and
existentialism, 8, 42, 84, 90, 150 election, 5, 11, 127, 171, 190,
‘L’Existentialisme est un humanisme’ 192
(Sartre), 150 Collège de France lectures, 1,
experience, 14, 25, 41, 69, 87, 110, 11–12, 32, 116, 133
183 correspondence, 18, 20, 111, 127,
Experience and Judgement (Husserl), 135, 184
16, 40, 42 cultural postings, 126–43, 148–52
experimental psychology, 29, 30, 31, dating of works, 5, 31–2, 35–6, 40,
47 44, 53, 88, 97, 102, 120, 183
exploitation, 74, 180 defence of theses, 6, 149, 165,
Ey, Henri, 44, 81, 98, 102, 103, 107, 167–70
108 depression, 27, 47, 134
diploma thesis on Hegel, 5, 11–17,
family, 45, 131 32, 155
Fano, Michel, 123 draft materials, 3, 4–5
fantasy, 91–2 examiner for ENS entrance
Farce du cuvier, La, 129 concours, 171
Faust (Goethe), 82 fellowship at Fondation Thiers,
Faux pas (Blanchot), 112 28–9, 167, 191
Faye, Jean-Pierre, 27 in Hamburg, 3, 4, 6, 148–65, 191
Feneyrou, Laurent, 124 homosexuality, 79, 141–3, 151–2
Féret, René, 50 interviews, 2, 21–2, 48–50, 100–1,
Ferrier de la Martinière, Louis, 95 133, 138, 172, 182–3
festivals, 99 in Italy, 113–14
Festugière, A. J., 129 in Lille, 5, 6, 16, 28–32, 35, 43, 51,
Feuerbach, Ludwig, 32, 33, 41, 44 89, 191
Fichte, Johann Gottlieb, 12, 14, 15, in Paris, 4, 5, 6, 7–27, 28, 30–1,
32 132, 134–5, 171
Fink, Eugen, 16, 42, 95, 111, 121 published works see individual titles
First World Congress of Psychiatry, relationship with Barraqué, 6,
80 123–5, 127
Flaubert, Gustave, 3 teaching career, 3, 5, 6, 28–46, 111,
Foerster, Otfrid, 107 116, 126–31, 136–7, 149–50,
Folie et déraison see History of 192
Madness (Foucault) teaching notes and materials,
Fondation Thiers, 28–9, 167, 191 31–46, 114
forced labour, 107 television and radio appearances,
Formal and Transcendental Logic 11, 50, 99, 131, 172
(Husserl), 40 translations, 2, 5, 6, 37, 39, 51,
Formation du concept de réflexe, La 80–108, 149, 152–65, 168, 170,
(Canguilhem), 26 191–2
Förster-Nietzsche, Elisabeth, 114–15 tributes to Hyppolite, 11–12,
Foucault, Anne, 3 115–16
Foucault, Denys, 3 university studies, 4, 5, 7–27
Foucault, Marcel, 57 unpublished manuscripts, 5, 6,
Index 271
23, 31–43, 51, 88, 89, 93, 108, Geist, 155–7

110–12, 116–18, 191 Gemüt, 155–7
in Uppsala, 3, 4, 5–6, 62, 100, 102, genealogy, 115–16, 117
114, 122, 126–39, 191 General Psychopathology (Jaspers)
in Warsaw, 3, 4, 6, 139–43, 165, Genet, Jean, 128
191 genetic psychology, 45
work in hospitals and prisons, Genette, Gérard, 30, 47
46–50, 62, 146, 191 geography, 57, 131, 152
working practices, 4–5, 133 geometry, 40, 95
Foucault, Paul, 3, 47, 148 George, Stefan, 95
Foucault à Münsterlingen (Bert and German Ideology, The (Marx and
Basso), 99 Engels), 78
Foucault: The Birth of Power (Elden), Gesammelte Schriften (von
1, 2, 116, 190 Weizsäcker), 107
Foucault w Warszawie (Ryziński), ‘Geschehnis und Erlebnis’
139–40, 141, 142–3 (Binswanger), 89
Foucault’s Last Decade (Elden), 1, 2, Gestalt theory, 17, 21, 23, 29, 41, 54,
190 102–5, 111
Francisco, Alessandro de Lima, 18 Gestaltkreis, Der (von Weizsäcker),
Frankfurt, 16 38, 101–8
Freiburg, 9, 20, 107, 121–2 Giraudoux, Jean, 129, 130
French Communist Party (PCF), 3, 8, God, 30, 34, 35, 41, 163
17, 24, 27, 78–9, 142, 181 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 82
French Revolution, 178 Goldmann, Lucien, 122
Fresnes prison, 47–8, 146 Goldstein, Kurt, 44, 57, 64
Freud, Anna, 45, 67 Gomułka, Władysław, 139, 141
Freud, Sigmund, 17–20, 36–7, 39, 41, Gordon, Colin, 187–8
43–6, 54, 57, 60, 62, 66–7, 74, Göttingen, 27
77, 81, 88, 91–2, 94, 95, 112, Gouhier, Henri, 7, 8, 28, 167, 169,
135, 176, 177, 183 170
Friedmann, Georges, 17 Gourevitch, Victor, 80
From the Closed World to the Open “Goûts et des couleurs, Des”
Universe (Koyré), 10 (Barraqué), 125
Fruchaud, Henri-Paul, 12 Gradies, Jean-Louis, 150
‘Function and Field of Speech and Grammaire, La (Labiche), 129
Language in Psychoanalysis’ Gregor, Mary, 152
(Lacan), 18 Grenier, Jean, 172
Fundamental Concepts of Griffiths, Paul, 124, 125
Metaphysics, The (Heidegger), Gros, Frédéric, 102, 122
120–1 Gros-Azorin, Caroline, 101
Grundformen und Erkenntnis
Gallimard, 135, 167, 174, 185, 188, menshlichen Daseins
191 (Binswanger), 37, 39
Gallimard, Claude, 135 Guibert, Hervé, 1
Gandillac, Maurice de, 122, 167–8, Guillaume, Paul, 58
170 Guterman, Norbert, 17
Garcin, Philippe, 184
Garden of Earthly Delights, The Häberlin, Paul, 90
(Bosch), 179 Hacking, Ian, 187–8
Gascar, Pierre, 151 Halbwachs, Maurice, 39
Gay Science, The (Nietzsche), 34, 117 hallucinations, 63
272 Index
Halpern, Florence, 80 appendices, 185

Hamburg, 3, 4, 6, 138, 148–65, 191 Canguilhem acts as rapporteur,
Hammarström, Göran, 127–9, 130–1, 149, 165, 166
137–8 defence of, 6, 149, 165, 167–70
happiness, 34, 94 described by Foucault as his first
Harper and Row, 182, 184 book, 2, 5, 112, 182–3
Hasselrot, Bengt, 139 development of themes used in, 40,
Hebbel, Friedrich, 95 101
Heckman, John, 11 footnotes, 186, 187, 188
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 5, 6, inside cover note, 190–1
8, 11–17, 21, 25, 32–4, 45, 83, Lindroth’s rejection of, 135–7,
112, 118, 120, 122, 130, 154–6, 139
158, 160, 168, 191 prefaces, 96, 164–5, 173, 183, 185,
Heidegger, Martin, 5, 6, 8–11, 17, 186, 188, 191
20–1, 34–8, 40, 42, 44, 53–6, 70, publication of, 6, 166–7
78, 81–8, 90, 91, 95, 101, 103, reception and reviews, 96, 97,
105–7, 111–12, 118–24, 146, 171–3
162, 168 reprints, 185, 187, 188, 191
Heidegger: Denker in Dürftiger Zeit summary of content, 143–7
(Löwith), 35, 121 work on in Uppsala, 5, 131–9
Hell, Victor, 148 work on in Warsaw, 139–41
Helvétius, Claude Adrien, 33 History of Sexuality (Foucault), 1, 39,
Heraclitus, 71, 95 183
Herder, Johann Goffried von, 12, 14, Hitler, Adolf, 122
95 Hölderlin, Friedrich, 122, 179
heredity, 44 ‘Hölderlin and the Essence of Poetry’
hermaphrodites, 146 (Heidegger), 119, 145
L’Hermite, François Tristan, 95 Holocaust, 8
Hérodote, 48 Holzwege (Heidegger), 9–10, 34,
heterotopias, 101 119–20
Histoire de la folie see History of ‘Homer and Classical Philology’
Madness (Foucault), 116
Histoire de la philosophie européenne Hommage à Jean Hyppolite
(Weber), 51, 53, 62, 126 (collection), 12
Histoire de la sexualité see History of homosexuality, 79, 141–3, 144, 146,
Sexuality 151–2
Histoire de Paul (1975), 50 Hôpital Général, 143, 144
historical a priori, 57–8, 60 Hôpital Sainte-Anne, 18–20, 31, 47,
history 49–50, 61, 81, 102, 135, 146
Foucault’s study of, 7 Horney, Karen, 39
Hegel’s conception of, 14–15 hospitals, 46–50, 77, 141, 143–5,
individual history, 67–8, 74, 78, 146, 177–8, 191; see also
180 asylums
of knowledge, 117 Howard, Richard, 187
of philosophy, 8–11, 43 Hugo, Victor, 95
of political thought, 24 Huisman, Denis, 53, 54, 62
of psychology, 26, 49, 51, 54–7, 77, Human Existence and Transcendence
166, 169 (Wahl), 8–9
of science, 10, 26, 132, 171–2, 190 ‘Human Sciences and Phenomenology’
History of Madness (Foucault) (Merleau-Ponty), 23, 111
abridged version, 6, 167, 185–8 humanism, 123, 178
Index 273
Humanism and Terror (Merleau- Introductory Lectures on

Ponty), 23 Psychoanalysis (Freud), 57, 67
Humbert, Gilbert, 123 Ionesco, Eugene, 130
Hume, David, 24–5, 45, 46 IQ tests, 44, 45, 57
Husserl, Edmund, 6, 8, 15–17, 22, 30, Italiaander, Rolf, 151–2
32, 37, 40–6, 53, 80, 88, 91–2, Italy, 113–14
94–5, 103, 110–12, 146, 158–9,
191 Jackson, John Hughlings, 44, 65–6
Hyppolite, Jean, 5–9, 11–16, 18, James, William, 109
21, 27, 43, 95, 115, 122, 130, Janet, Pierre, 44, 45, 63, 66, 77, 176
148–50, 154, 165, 167–8, 170, Janicaud, Dominique, 9
171 Jarry, Alfred, 139
hysteria, 54, 63, 67 Jaspers, Karl, 34, 35, 36, 40, 54, 77,
95, 112, 114–15
Idea of Phenomenology (Husserl), 46 jealous woman case study (Freud), 67
Ideas (Husserl), 15, 40, 42 Jena, 15, 16, 36
L’Idée de loi naturelle (Boutroux), Jouhaud, Michel, 22
25 Jouhet, Serge, 172
L’Idée d’être chez Heidegger (Wahl), Judaism, 9, 141
9 Judge Schreber case study (Freud), 19,
Ikor, Roger, 150 44, 91
Ilse case study (Binswanger), 88 Julian, Marcel, 185
Imaginary, The (Sartre), 95 Jung, Carl, 36, 95
imagination, 85, 88, 89, 91, 93–6, Justes, Les (Camus), 150
158
Imipramine, 100 Kafka, Franz, 1
In Praise of Folly (Erasmus), 169 Kahn, Gilbert, 151
incarceration, 48, 65, 141, 143–6, Kanapa, Jean, 27
172–3, 177–8, 190 Kant, Immanuel, 6, 8, 9, 12–15, 24–5,
incest, 131 32–3, 35, 41–2, 50, 95, 111, 119,
individual history, 67–8, 74, 78, 180 122–3, 149, 152–65, 168, 170,
Inhelder, Bärbel, 45 190, 191
instincts, 74, 75, 87, 117, 181 Foucault’s introduction, 16, 111,
Institut de psychologie de Paris, 31 149, 152–65, 168, 170, 190
Institut Français, Hamburg, 148–9, Foucault’s ‘Notice historique’,
151, 153 152–3
Institut Français, Uppsala, 62, 130 Foucault’s translation, 6, 111, 123,
Institute of Neurological Research, 149, 152–65, 168, 170
101 Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics
intelligence, 25, 44, 45, 57, 59, 60 (Heidegger), 35, 119, 162
International Congress of Kantor, Manfred, 138
Psychotherapy, 99 Kardiner, Abram, 45
Interpretation of Dreams, The Kaufmann, Walter, 34, 35, 114
(Freud), 17, 43, 54, 62, 91 Keller, Wilhelm, 33
intersubjectivity, 68 Kendall, Stuart, 113
‘Intervention on Transference’ Kepler, Johannes, 189
(Lacan), 19 Kiejman, Georges, 185
‘Introduction and Reply to Hyppolite’ Kierkegaard, Søren, 8, 16, 130
(Lacan), 19 Kleberg, Tönnes, 132
Introduction to Metaphysics Klein, Melanie, 45, 92, 95
(Heidegger), 10, 120 Klossowski, Pierre, 4, 113
274 Index
knowledge ‘Letter on Humanism’ (Heidegger), 8,

absolute knowledge, 13, 15, 117 10, 119, 120, 121
and cruelty, 178 Lévi-Strauss, Claude, 46, 131, 167
history of, 117 Lévinas, Emmanuel, 11, 16, 121, 122
and power, 16, 145 Lewin, Kurt, 41, 58
see also epistemology Liberté humaine, La (Schelling), 17
Knowledge of Life (Canguilhem), 26 libido, 60, 66, 67
Koffka, Kurt, 102–3 Lille, 5, 6, 16, 28–32, 35, 43, 51, 89,
Kohn, Albert, 124 191
Kojève, Alexandre, 11, 16, 32, 83 Lindroth, Sten, 135–7, 138, 139
Kołakowski, Leszek, 141 linguistics, 20, 22, 190; see also
Koyré, Alexandre, 10–11, 22, 83, language
121, 189–90 Linton, Ralph, 45
Kraeplin, Emil, 63–4 Lipps, Theodor, 41
Krakus, Anna, 140, 142 literature, 3–4, 7, 39, 72–3, 82,
Kreuzlingen, 36, 80, 98, 146 92–3, 95, 101, 128, 130, 145–6,
Kuehn, Manfred, 162 149–50, 169, 170, 177, 179, 181,
Kuhn, Roland, 29, 36, 37, 70–1, 78, 186, 190, 192
80–1, 88, 98, 99–100, 102, 108, little Hans case study (Freud), 67
146 lobotomy, 50, 77
Logic (Hegel), 11, 13, 16
Labiche, Eugène, 129 Logic (Kant), 161, 168
labour, 42, 107 Logical Investigations (Husserl), 16,
Labrouste, Henri, 4 42, 43, 91, 92
Lacan, Jacques, 11, 17, 18–20, 45, 66, Logic and Existence (Hyppolite), 11
77, 81, 92, 95, 102, 122, 172 Louden, Robert B., 152, 153, 155,
Lachelier, Jules, 25 159–60
Lacombe, Olivier, 29 Louvain, 42
Lacroix, Jean, 62, 78, 97, 172 Louvre, 140
Lagache, Daniel, 7, 17, 39, 57, 148, love, 37, 39, 60, 117, 128, 130
167, 169 ‘Love in French Literature’ (Foucault),
Laing, R. D., 101 128, 130
Lagrange, Jacques, 30, 31, 32, 34, Löwith, Karl, 16, 34, 35, 121
43–6 Lukács, Georg, 16
Landgrebe, Ludwig, 42 Lycée Henri-IV, 7, 77
language, 14, 22–3, 39, 70, 85, 91–2, Lyon, 22
164, 177, 190; see also linguistics Lyotard, Jean-François, 27, 53
Laplanche, Jean, 12, 17, 27 Lysenko, Trofim, 27
Latin, 7, 24, 156, 160–1, 164
Laudenback, Roland, 134 McDougall, William, 45
Lauer, Quentin, 43 Macbeth (Shakespeare), 92, 135
‘Lebensfunktion und innere Macey, David, 1, 3, 20, 26, 29–30,
Lebensgeschichte’ (Binswanger), 46–8, 60–1, 78–9, 89, 95–8, 101,
89 111–13, 117, 119, 132, 134, 136,
Lectures on Logic (Kant), 33 139, 141–2, 146, 148, 165, 182
Lectures on the Will to Know Macherey, Pierre, 78, 168
(Foucault), 116 madness, 3, 6, 49, 71–3, 99–100, 116,
Lefebvre, Henri, 11, 17, 62, 114 135–9, 141, 143–7, 150, 156–7,
Leibniz, Gottfried, 8, 19, 25, 33, 45, 166, 168–9, 172–84, 186, 190;
46, 95 see also mental illness
Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim, 33 Magendie, François, 54
Index 275
Magritte, René, 140 memory, 25, 116

Mains sales, Les (Sartre), 129 Mendès France, Pierre, 129
Maison de France, Uppsala, 126, 128, Meninas, Las (Velázquez), 124
129, 133, 137 mental illness, 32, 44, 48, 50, 62–79,
Maladie mentale et personnalité 141, 145, 147, 156–7, 174–84;
(Foucault), 2, 20–1, 44, 51, see also madness
53, 56, 62–79, 94, 97–8, 101, mental medicine, 63–4, 175; see also
112–13, 146, 172, 174–84 medicine
Maladie mentale et psychologie Mercure de France, 172
(Foucault), 2–3, 72, 78, 97, 143, Merkur, 120
146, 174–84 Merleau-Ponty, Maurice, 6, 7, 11, 17,
Maldiney, Henri, 84, 87 21–3, 28, 40, 42–3, 45, 57, 59,
Malebranche, Nicolas, 28, 33, 146 78, 81, 103, 108, 110–12, 121–2,
Malebranche, Biran and Bergson 131, 171
on the Union of Body and Soul Messiaen, Olivier, 123
(Merleau-Ponty), 22 metapathology, 63, 65, 175
Malentendu, Le (Camus), 150 Metaphysical Foundations of Logic
Malraux, André, 129, 130 (Heidegger), 20
Mandrou, Robert, 172 metaphysics, 10, 33, 158, 162
Manet, Edouard, 124 metapsychology, 17, 19
Mannoni, Octave, 172 Meyerson, Ignace, 18
Marcel, Gabriel, 122, 150 Michaux, Henri, 130, 150
Marivaux, Pierre Carlet de, 150 milieu, 13, 38–9, 64–5, 70, 75–7, 87,
Marx, Karl, 11, 15, 33–4, 44, 78, 105, 180
112, 118, 156, 160 Mill, John Stuart, 54
Marxism, 21, 29, 42, 72, 78–9, 94, Miller, Jacques-Alain, 18–19
98, 111, 180–1, 182, 183 Miller, James, 2, 78, 97, 111
Maskendeutungen in Rorschaschshe Minkowska, Françoise, 102
Versuch (Kuhn), 80–1 Minkowski, Eugène, 69–70, 81, 102
master/slave dialectic, 16 Miquel, Jean-François, 136
materialism, 76–7, 79 Mirbel, Célestin de, 95
mathematics, 26, 55, 172 Misrahi, Robert, 98
Mauriac, Claude, 3, 22, 187 ‘Mistaking of the Subject Supposed to
Mauriac, François, 130 Know’ (Lacan), 19
Mauss, Marcel, 46, 131 Mitsein, 87
Mauzi, Robert, 129, 165 Mitwelt, 38–9, 70, 87
Mazon, Paul, 28–9 Moeller, Charles, 150
Mead, George Herbert, 109 Molière, 128, 129, 146
Mead, Margaret, 45 Molino, Jean, 30
meaning, 91–3, 131, 163 monads, 10
Meaning and Content of Sexual Monde, Le, 36, 78, 172
Perversions (Boss), 40 Montaigne, Michel de, 186, 189
Médecin volant, Le (Molière), 129 Montenot, Jean, 9
medication, 47, 77, 100 Montesquieu, 24, 62
medicine, 3, 26, 49, 57, 63–4, 103, Montessori, Maria, 45
107, 132, 135, 144, 175–8, 180, Montherlant, Henry de, 130
190; see also mental medicine; Moravia, Alberto, 129
organic medicine Moreno, Jacob, 45
Meditations (Descartes), 143 Morère, Jean-Édouard, 57
Meinong, Alexis, 41 Morichau-Beauchant, Pierre, 18
Meland, Père, 33 Mörike, Eduard, 82
276 Index
Mots et les choses, Les see Order of normality, 40, 56, 63, 64–5, 149
Things, The (Foucault) Nouvelle Critique, 3, 27, 79
Mots, mythes et réalité dans la Nouvelle Revue française, 121, 172,
philosophie de Heidegger (Wahl), 189
10 Novalis, 95
Mouches, Les (Sartre), 150 Nuit et jour (Puget), 150
movement, 103, 104–6
Münsterlingen, 80, 99, 146 Oberg, Jean-Christophe, 136
Musée National d’Art Moderne, 140 obsessive behaviours, 63, 67
music, 47, 123–5, 129, 133 Oedipal complex, 45, 66, 73
Musset, Alfred de, 129 Ombredane, André, 29, 80
Mythical Thought (Cassirer), 40 ‘On Nature’ (Parmenides), 8
myths, 41, 74, 93, 129, 131, 172, 181 On Nietzsche (Bataille), 112, 114
On Paranoid Psychosis in
Napoleon, 15 Relationship to Personality
Natorp, Paul, 41 (Lacan), 18
nature, 21, 33, 103, 116 On the Genealogy of Morality
Nazism, 8, 26, 42, 101, 107–8, 113, (Nietzsche), 40, 115, 155
121–2 On the Normal and Pathological
neo-Kantianism, 36, 162 (Canguilhem), 26, 56
Nerval, Gérard de, 145, 179, 181 ‘On the Work of Art in the Age
Néry, Jean, 27 of Mechanical Reproduction’
Neue Schweizer Rundschau, 87 (Benjamin), 168
neuroses, 63–4, 66–7, 73, 74 ontology, 23, 30, 37–9, 42, 84–5,
‘Neurotic’s Individual Myth, The’ 89–90, 94, 98, 162
(Lacan), 19 Optics (Descartes), 33
New Ways in Psychoanalysis Opus Postumum (Kant), 154, 161,
(Horney), 39 168
Nicolas of Cusa, 186 Order of Things, The (Foucault), 5,
Nicolaysen, Rainer, 149–50 26, 50, 123, 124, 146, 164, 174,
Nietzsche, Friedrich, 5, 6, 8, 10, 185, 190
11, 17, 34–6, 40–1, 43, 45, 53, organic medicine, 63–4; see also
111–18, 120–5, 145–6, 155, medicine
162–3, 165, 168–70, 178, 181, organic pathology, 63–4, 76; see also
186, 190 pathology
‘Nietzsche and Christianity’ (Jaspers), Organism, The (Goldstein), 57
115 Origin of Geometry, The (Husserl),
Nietzsche et la philosophie (Deleuze), 30, 40, 43
115 ‘Overcoming Metaphysics’
‘Nietzsche, Freud, Marx’ (Foucault), (Heidegger), 34, 35
115
‘Nietzsche, Genealogy, History’ Paracelsus, 135, 146
(Foucault), 12, 115–16, 117 paranoia, 63, 67
Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Paris, 4, 5, 6, 7–27, 28, 30–1, 132,
Antichrist (Kaufmann), 35 134–5, 171
Nietzsche: The Will to Power as Art Paris Insitut de Psychologie, 7
(Heidegger), 10 Parmenides, 8, 27
‘Nietzsche’s Word: “God is Dead”’ Part du feu, La (Blanchot), 112
(Heidegger), 34 Partage Formel (Char), 94
Nolten, the Painter (Mörike), 82 Pascal, Blaise, 147
Nordström, Elsa, 129 Passeron, Jean-Claude, 3, 30
Index 277
‘Pathologie Mentale et Organisation’ philosophy

(Hyppolite), 148 Foucault’s study of, 5, 7, 8–17,
pathology, 40, 56, 63–77, 24–7
149, 175–8, 180; see also Foucault’s teaching of, 30, 43, 50
metapathology; psychopathology history of, 8–11, 43
Pavlov, Ivan Petrovich, 29, 30, 75, 77, Philosophy of Arithmetic (Husserl),
78–9, 175, 181, 182 42
pedagogy see education Philosophy of History (Hegel), 11
Peirce, Charles Sanders, 109 phobias, 63
Penal Code, 73 physics, 26, 57
Pensée de Heidegger et la Poésie de Piaget, Jean, 22, 45, 54, 58
Hölderlin (Wahl), 9 Picasso, Pablo, 150
Pensées (Pascal), 147 Pierre Rivière case, 48
perception, 21, 23, 25, 103, 104–6, Pinel, Philippe, 44, 72, 77, 144–5,
127 146, 178
Perse, Saint-John, 130 Pinguet, Maurice, 19–20, 30, 94, 97,
Person des Schizophrenen, Die 113–14, 115, 122, 133
(Wyrsch), 80–1 Platner, Ernst, 32
personality, 25, 30, 44, 45, 64, 66–7, Plato, 8, 10, 24–5, 39, 95
69, 73, 76, 176, 182 ‘Plato’s Doctrine of Truth’
personality disorders, 45 (Heidegger), 10, 119
Pétain, Maréchal, 134 Plon, 134–5, 138, 167, 185, 188
Petite histoire de l’existentialisme Plotinus, 25
(Wahl), 10 poetics, 26, 95
phenomenological psychology, 63, Poitiers, 7, 47
68–9, 74, 100 Polin, Raymond, 29
Phénoménologie du masque (Kuhn), political economy, 144, 180, 190
81, 102 political theory, 23, 24, 149, 150
‘Phénoménologie et psychologie’ Politzer, Georges, 17–18, 41, 58, 78,
(Foucault), 40–3, 51, 92, 127 98
phenomenology, 6, 8, 12–17, 21–3, polygraph tests, 47
32, 38, 40, 42, 46, 53, 81, 83–4, positivism, 25, 55
89, 92, 95, 100, 110–12, 127, Possédés, Les (Camus), 150
158–9 possession, 72, 73, 176–7
Phenomenology and Dialectical power
Materialism (Thao), 42, 110 and knowledge, 16, 145
Phenomenology of Perception medical power, 49, 145, 180
(Merleau-Ponty), 21, 22, 57, 103 Pradines, Maurice, 56–7, 59
Phenomenology of Spirit (Hegel), 11, présence, 68, 82–5, 105–6, 119
13–16, 154 Presses Universitaires de France (PUF),
Phenomenon of Man (Teilhard de 97, 167, 174, 182, 184–5
Chardin), 131 prisons, 46–50, 146; see also
philosophical anthropology, 6, 16–17, incarceration
32–5, 39, 46, 50, 63, 89–90, Problèmes actuels du marxisme
108, 114, 123, 161; see also (Lefebvre), 62
anthropology Prose of the World, The (Merleau-
‘Philosophie als strenge Wissenschaft’ Ponty), 23
(Husserl), 42–3 Proulx, Daniel, 119
Philosophie de Martin Heidegger, La Proust, Marcel, 130
(de Waelhens), 83 Psychiatrie et analyse existentielle
Philosophies group, 17 (Foucault), 51, 127
278 Index
psychoanalysis, 18–20, 29, 30, 36–9, 145, 176–7, 186; see also
50, 54, 66, 77, 81, 91–2, 95, Christianity; God; theology
100, 145 ‘Religious Experience in French
‘Psychologie de 1850 à 1950, La’ Literature’ (Foucault), 128, 130
(Foucault), 51, 53, 54–7, 97 ‘Remarks on Daniel Lagache’ (Lacan),
Psychologie et Métaphysique 19
(Lachelier), 25 ‘Remarques sur l’enseignement de la
psychologism, 34, 77 Phénoménologie’ (Foucault), 110
psychology Renaissance, 143, 145, 176
Foucault’s hospital and prison Resistance, 8, 134
work, 46–50, 62, 146, 191 reverie, 95–6
Foucault’s study of, 5, 17–23 Revue de métaphysique et de morale,
Foucault’s teaching of, 28–32, 10, 98
43–6, 47, 50 Revue Internationale de Philosophie,
history of, 26, 49, 51, 54–7, 77, 56, 57
166, 169 Revue philosophique de la France et
relation between research and de l’étranger, 57
practice, 59 Ribot, Théodule-Armand, 44, 54
relation to natural sciences, 54–5, Ricœur, Paul, 11, 40, 53, 110, 112,
58, 59 122, 131
psychometry, 59, 61 Riggins, Stephen, 49
psychopathology, 29, 47, 63–77, 91, rights, 72–3
147, 175–8; see also pathology Robbe-Grillet, Alain, 4, 123, 151
Psychophysique, La (Marcel Rocher, Daniel, 39, 102–6
Foucault), 57 Roncayolo, Marcel, 131
psychoses, 19, 63–4, 73 Rorschach tests, 29, 45, 47, 54, 80
Puget, Claude-André, 150 Rostock, 153
punishment, 117, 178 Roudinesco, Élisabeth, 36
Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, 41, 150
Racine, Jean, 95, 128, 144, 172 Rousseau, juge de Jean-Jaques
Raison, La, 45, 79 (Rousseau), 150
Rat, Maurice, 7 Roussel, Raymond, 4, 36, 145, 150,
‘Rat Man’ case study (Freud), 19 151, 172, 174, 179, 181, 190
‘Raumproblem in der Royaumont conference, 115
Psychopathologie, Das’ Royce, Josiah, 109
(Binswanger), 95 Rudloff, General von, 32
Ravel, Maurice, 129 Rümke, Henricus Cornelius, 95
Raymond Roussel (Foucault), 173–4, Ryziński, Remigiusz, 139–40, 141,
185 142–3
Razenkov, Ivan Petrovich, 79
réalité humain, 34, 83, 119 Sabot, Philippe, 29, 36, 40, 43, 127
Rebeyrol, Philippe, 139, 148 Sade, Marquis de, 4, 128, 146
‘Recherche scientifique et la Saguer, Louis, 123
psychologie, La’ (Foucault), 53, Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de, 151
57–62, 97 Samoyault, Tiphaine, 129–30
reflexes, 26, 75, 79, 131, 175, Sarraute, Nathalie, 129
181 Sartre, Jean-Paul, 9, 11, 16, 23, 37,
Reflexionen zur Anthropologie (Kant), 42, 44, 46, 57, 84, 93, 95, 98,
153, 168 101, 103–4, 112–13, 119, 121–2,
regression, 66–7, 73–4 129, 149–50
religion, 33, 34, 72, 74, 128, 130, Saussure, Ferdinand de, 22
Index 279
Sauvy, Alfred, 131 society, 45

Savi, Pierre, 151 sociology, 29, 46, 54, 57, 71
Scheler, Max, 32, 44, 162 Sophist (Plato), 10
Schelling, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Sorbonne, 7, 9, 10, 17, 22–3, 24, 25,
von, 12, 17, 95 80, 115, 122, 135, 168–9
schizophrenia, 36, 37–8, 63–4, 69–70, soul, the, 22, 84, 156–7, 178
73, 74–5, 93, 99, 100 Soulier de satin, Le (Claudel), 130
Schizophrenie (Binswanger), 37 Soviet Union, 76, 79
Schmidt, Dennis, 121 spatiality, 22, 23, 38, 45, 69–70, 93,
Schmidt-Radefeldt, Jürgen, 150 95, 103, 104–6
Schopenhauer, Arthur, 25 Spencer, Herbert, 54
Schrift, Alan, 24, 25, 115 Spinoza, Baruch, 8, 25, 33, 41, 46, 95
Schubert, Franz, 123 Stalin, Joseph, 79
Schütz, Christian Gottfried, 153 Stanford Binet test, 44
science Stimmung, 85–7
history of, 10, 26, 132, 171–2, 190 Stockholm, 130
philosophy of, 26 Strasbourg, 25, 26
relation of natural sciences to Strauss, Erwin, 33, 95
psychology, 54–5, 58, 59 structuralism, 112, 173, 183
see also individual disciplines Structure of Behaviour, The (Merleau-
Search for the Absolute, The (Balzac), Ponty), 21, 22, 78, 103
3 Study of Man (Linton), 45
Second World War, 8, 9, 42, 47, 103, Stumpf, Carl, 41
107–8, 134, 142 subjectivity, 23, 43, 71, 123, 162,
Sender Freies Berlin, 131 169, 176
Seneca, 25 sublimity, 160–1
Sense and Non-Sense (Merleau- suicide, 37–8, 70, 93
Ponty), 23 Suzanne Urban (Binswanger), 99, 102
Sensible World and the World of symbols, 91, 131
Expression (Merleau-Ponty), 23 Szilasi, Wilhelm, 88, 95
Sentiments et la vie morale, Les
(Lacroix), 62 Table Ronde, La, 134–5, 139, 147,
Séquence cantata (Barraqué), 124 168
Serres, Michel, 12, 172 Taminiaux, Jacques, 22
sexuality, 27, 45, 54, 60, 66, 67, 117, Tarde, Gabriel, 45
141–3, 146, 151–2, 190 Tartuffe (Molière), 128
Shakespeare, William, 92–3, 95, 135 taste, 125
Sheridan, Alan, 182 Taylorism, 59
ship of fools, 99, 132, 143, 186 Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre, 131
Siebeck, Paul, 42 Tel Quel, 3–4
Signs (Merleau-Ponty), 23 temporality, 14, 23, 25, 30, 38, 69,
signs, 127, 131, 164 91, 93, 103, 104–5
Simon, Claude, 129 Temps modernes, Les 35, 81, 121,
Simon, Gérard, 30, 31, 32, 34, 43–6 134, 172
Sketch for a Theory of the Emotions Temps vécu, Les (Minkowski), 69–70
(Sartre), 57, 98 Temptation of Saint Anthony
sleep, 60, 71, 92–3 (Flaubert), 3
Służba Bezpieczeństwa (SB), 142–3 Thao, Trân Duc, 42, 110
social psychology, 43, 44–5, 50 theatre, 8, 99, 128, 129–30, 150
Société française de philosophie, 8, 9 Théâtre Libre, 130, 131
Société française de psychanalyse, 17 Theodicy (Leibniz), 33
280 Index
theology, 16, 30, 32, 33; see also 96–100, 127, 134–5, 146, 164–5,
religion 172
Thing and Space (Husserl), 46 Verne, Jules, 4
Three Dialogues (Berkeley), 25 Verret, Michel, 27
Thus Spoke Zarathustra (Nietzsche), Veyne, Paul, 30, 113
115, 125 Vichy regime, 134
Times Literary Supplement, 172 Victor, Paul-Émile, 150
Titres et travaux scientifiques (Paul Vilar, Jean, 130
Foucault), 3 Vincennes, 116, 117
Totem and Taboo (Freud), 54 Virgil, 62
Traité de Métaphysique (Wahl), 10 Visible and the Invisible, The
Traité de psychologie (Pradines), 56 (Merleau-Ponty), 23
transcendental philosophy, 12–16, Volk im Werden, 107
161–2 Voltaire, 125, 150
Treatise of Human Nature, A (Hume), voluntary internment, 73
25 von Uexküll, Jakob, 39, 87, 103, 105
Trombadori, Duccio, 21 von Weizsäcker, Carl Freidrich, 101
truth, 9, 15, 34, 116, 117–18, 163, von Weizsäcker, Ernst, 101
181, 189–90 von Weizsäcker, Richard, 101
Tuke, William, 144–5, 146, 178 von Weizsäcker, Viktor, 2, 5, 38, 39,
Tunisia, 1, 4, 43, 109, 124 51, 101–8, 126
Twilight of the Idols (Nietzsche), Foucault and Rocher’s translation,
34 2, 5, 39, 51, 101–8, 126
Vorträge und Aufsätze (Heidegger),
Über Ideenflucht (Binswanger), 37, 34, 35, 119–20
69, 81 Vuillemin, Jules, 29, 34, 35, 121,
Ubu Roi (Jarry), 139 171
Umwelt, 38–9, 70, 87, 104–5
unconscious, 58, 59–60 Wagner, Richard, 123
Union Générale d’Éditions, 185 Wahl, Jean, 6, 7, 8–11, 13, 16, 21,
United States, 10–11, 42, 109–10 109, 112, 113, 114, 115, 118,
University of California Press, 184 120–1, 122
Untimely Meditations (Nietzsche), Waiting for Godot (Beckett), 31
113–14 Waller, Erik, 132, 135
Uppsala, 3, 4, 5–6, 62, 100, 102, 114, Wallon, Henri, 67
122, 126–39, 191 Wandlungen in der Auffassung
Urban, Suzanne, 99, 102 und Deutung des Traumes
(Binswanger), 82
van Breda, Herman, 42 war, 74, 75
van Gogh, Vincent, 145 Warburg, Aby, 36
‘Variations on the Standard Warsaw, 3, 4, 6, 139–43, 165, 191
Treatment’ (Lacan), 19 Was heißt Denken/What is Called
Vatulescu, Cristina, 140, 142 Thinking? (Heidegger), 34, 35,
Velázquez, Diego, 124 120
Vendeuvre-du-Poitou (Foucault family Watson, John B., 58
home), 3, 5 Weber, Alfred, 53, 62, 126
venereal disease, 143–4, 177, 186 Weber, Jean-Paul, 172
Verdeaux, Georges, 20, 47, 80, 98–9, Webern, Anton, 123
100, 127, 146 West, Ellen, 37–8, 70, 93
Verdeaux, Jacqueline, 20, 26, 29, ‘What is an Author?’ (Foucault), 9
37, 39, 47–8, 61, 68, 80–8, 93, ‘What is Critique?’ (Foucault), 8
Index 281
‘What is Metaphysics?’ (Heidegger), world, 10, 13–14, 23, 42, 70–1, 74,
83, 85, 119, 121 87, 111, 127, 159
‘What is Philosophy?’ (Heidegger), World as Will and Representation,
122 The (Schopenhauer), 25
‘What is Psychology?’ (Canguilhem), Wundt, Wilhelm, 41
148 Wyrsch, Jakob, 36, 80–1
Whitebook, Joel, 31
‘Who is Nietzsche’s Zarathustra?’ York Retreat, 144
(Heidegger), 34, 35
Wichart, Heinrich, 32 Zambelli, Paola, 121
Wick, Armin, 150 Zeitbewusstseins (Husserl), 42
Will to Power, The (Nietzsche), 34 Zemb, Jean-Marie, 151
Williams, Forrest, 97–8 Zollikon seminars, 37
‘Wolf Man’ case study (Freud), 19, 46 Zünd, Jürg, 37, 69

Stuart Elden - The Early Foucault-Polity (2021)

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The Early Foucault

This book is the third of four major intellectual histories of Michel

Foucault’s Last Decade was published by Polity in 2016.

First published in 2021 by Polity Press

ISBN-13: 978-1-5095-2595-9 (hardback)

Names: Elden, Stuart, 1971- author.

Typeset in 10.5 on 12pt Sabon by

For further information on Polity, visit our website: politybooks.com

As a part of a series of books on Foucault, a project which has been

Energy and Industrial Strategy, and the Department of Politics and

John Russell, Parastou Saberi, Philippe Sabot, Christopher Smith, Bal

Key texts are referred to by abbreviations. For books translated as

Texts by Foucault and others

Blackwell, 2013, 11–83. Defert’s shorter revised chronol-

FMT ‘Foucault: Matérialité d’un travail. Entretien avec Daniel

Luxon (ed.) Archives of Infamy: Foucault on State Power

StAHbg Archiv Institut Français de Hambourg, Staatsarchiv

Reading and Writing

writers including Georges Bataille, Maurice Blanchot, André Breton,

reverse, or folded in half to group notes on a theme.19 Defert says that

Structure of this Study

of his relationship with the modernist composer Jean Barraqué. The

Foucault moved to the Lycée Henri-IV in Paris in 1945 shortly after

Philosophy and its History

in 1950 and included texts from 1936–46, notably one on Nietzsche.

Jean Hyppolite and the Diploma Thesis on Hegel

74–82/170–3), which seems to go beyond the standard honours to

1. What are the limits of the field of phenomenological exploration,

Foucault suggests that the first requires an ‘objective examination of

resolves some of the problems.62 He also recognizes the historical

Kant’s philosophy of the transcendental became, in history, a category

When we pass from Kant, inventor of the transcendental, to his succes-

Essentially we must ask Hegel how the ‘experience of a fact’ relates

The definition of the transcendental ego [Moi] comprises three

Each of these moments is, for Hegel, ‘dialectically defined’ in relation

transforms an historical question into a philosophical problem.82 He

e­xamination of Hegel’s work, largely but not exclusively through

of phenomenology in Husserl. However, the text is also notable for

the theme of the papers on technique.142 While Lacan’s seminar con-

duction of something he probably heard in a seminar; and Chapter

The great texts of Edmund Husserl, of Alexandre Koyré, formed

interests­– ­‘The Human Sciences and Phenomenology’. Student notes

Louis Althusser, Georges Canguilhem and the Agrégation

whose work on mathematics and physics set agendas and stand-

philosophy before going on to teach sociology. Mazon knew the Lille

A copy of Derrida’s own first book publication­– h ­ is translation and

the biographies. I will first discuss the three substantial manuscripts,

‘Connaissance de l’homme et réflexion transcendantale’

period, from theologians such as Emil Brunner and philosophers and

The dual relation of critical thought and anthropology in Kant opens

From here he moves to the nineteenth century, with analysis of Hegel,

human nature, religion and alienation­– ­both in Hegel and Marx,

the early secondary books on Heidegger, Karl Löwith’s Heidegger:

The Binswanger Manuscript

complete. There are some breaks, which suggest material is missing.

Heidegger supported what Binswanger was doing, but in later years

them in French: Umwelt is the material milieu, Mitwelt the social

philosophical works discussed as well, including Husserl’s Ideas I

it looks like a fair copy, written in full sentences. On several pages of

examination of Hegel’s work, largely but not exclusively through

interests– ‘The Human Sciences and Phenomenology’. Student notes

A copy of Derrida’s own first book publication– h is translation and

human nature, religion and alienation– both in Hegel and Marx,

The problem of contemporary psychology– and which is a matter of

athological forms of its activity’ (MMPe 94). Defence mechanisms

sychology has never been able to reconcile these splits, which he