History of Madness

767 Pages·2006·7.01 MB·English

by  Michel Foucault

Histooryf M adness
MichFeolu cault

History of Madness
Praise for this new edition:
‘One of the major works of the twentieth century is finally available in English.
This comprehensive translation finally overcomes one of the great divisions
within the world of reason; an occasion to revisit Madness and Civilization
as it was written.’ Paul Rabinow, University of California, Berkeley
‘With this beautiful and moving book, Michel Foucault transformed our
understanding of the processes that had made psychiatry possible – the
process which had brought its object, mental illness, into existence, and
which inscribed it into our modern imagination as pathology, negativity,
incompetence and deficiency. In studying the history of madness in this way,
Foucault also taught us crucial lessons about the assembling of what we have
come to call ‘civilization’. Now, at last, English speaking readers can have
access to the depth of scholarship that underpinned Foucault’s analysis:
I have no doubt that this long awaited translation will have a transformative
effect on a new generation of readers.’ Nikolas Rose, London School of
Economics
Reviews of the original French edition:
‘A thick manuscript arrived: a philosophy thesis on the relations between
madness and unreason in the classical age, by an author I did not know. I was
dazzled when I read it.’ Philippe Ariès
‘This magnificent book ... requires a mind that is capable of being in turn
a historian, a philosopher, a psychologist, and a sociologist ... never simply
one of these ... This is not a method that could be offered as an example;
it is not within the reach of just anybody. Something more than talent is
necessary.’ Fernand Braudel, Annales

Michel
Foucault
History of Madness
Edited by Jean Khalfa
Translated by Jonathan Murphy and Jean Khalfa
First published 2006 by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
First published in French as ‘Folie et Déraison: Histoire de la
folie à l’âge classique’ Librarie Plon, Paris, 1961.
This edition is a translation of ‘Histoire de la Folie à l’âge classique’
© Editions GALLIMARD, Paris, 1972
Appendices ‘Mon corps, ce papier, ce feu’ and ‘La folie, l’absence d’œuvre’
© Editions GALLIMARD, Paris, 1972
Appendix ‘Reply to Derrida’ from Michel Foucault, Dits et Ecrits Vol II
© Editions GALLIMARD, Paris, 1994
This English Translation © 2006 Routledge
Introduction and Editorial Matter © 2006 Jean Khalfa
Foreword © 2006 Ian Hacking
Ouvrage publié avec le concours du Ministère français chargé de la culture –
Centre National du Livre
This edition is published with the help of the French Ministry of Culture –
National Book Centre
Typeset in Joanna by RefineCatch Limited, Bungay, Suffolk
Printed and bound in Great Britain by MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 10: 0–415–27701–9
ISBN 10: 0–203–64260–0 (eBook)
ISBN 13: 978–0–415–27701–3
ISBN 13: 978–0–203–64260–3 (eBook)
Biography of Michel Foucault
Michel Foucault was born in Poitiers on 15 June 1926, the son of a doctor. He
finished his secondary education in Paris at the Lycée Henry IV in 1946 and
went on to study philosophy at the prestigious École Normale Supérieure,
attending in particular the lectures of Maurice Merleau-Ponty and working
with Jean Hyppolite, on Hegel, and with Louis Althusser. Despite suffering
from sporadic bouts of depression and a suicide attempt in 1948, Foucault
secured degrees in philosophy in 1948 and in psychology in 1950. He passed
his agrégation in philosophy in 1951. He joined the French Communist Party in
1950 and quit in 1952.
Lecturing at the École Normale Supérieure and working as a psychologist at
the Hôpital Sainte-Anne, in the early 1950s, he became dissatisfied with the
confines of French academic life and held diplomatic and academic posts in
Sweden (where he met and worked with Georges Dumézil), Poland and
Germany, whilst working on his thesis Folie et Déraison: Histoire de la folie à
l’âge classique. Initially rejected by Gallimard, it was published in 1961 by the
great historian Philippe Ariès at Librairie Plon, the publisher of Claude Lévi-
Strauss. It was hailed as ‘magnificent’ by Fernand Braudel. Several other now
famous works followed, including The Birth of the Clinic, The Order of Things,
and The Archaeology of Knowledge. In 1968, Foucault was appointed to a chair
at the new, experimental, University of Vincennes and, in 1970, was elected to
a prestigious chair at the Collège de France where he taught the History of
Systems of Thought.
While producing a very large and influential body of research during the 1960s
and 1970s, Foucault threw himself into political and social activism. He cam-
paigned in particular on behalf of homosexuals and for prison reform. In 1975
he published one of his most famous works, Discipline and Punish: Birth of the
Prison. Foucault travelled to North America in the late 1970s and early 1980s,
teaching annually at the University of California at Berkeley. Freely experi-
menting with LSD and the liberal sexual environment, he lived what he termed
‘limit experiences’. During that period, in addition to many articles
(published posthumously in four volumes), he wrote the three volumes of his
History of Sexuality.
Fatally ill with AIDS, Michel Foucault died in Paris on 25 June 1984 in the
Salpêtrière Hospital at the age of fifty-seven. After his death, the French prime
vi biography of michel foucault
minister issued a tribute and memorial homages featured on the front pages
of all the national press. In his obituary, Georges Dumézil wrote, ‘Foucault’s
intelligence literally knew no limits.’
C
ONTENTS
Foreword by Ian Hacking ix
Introduction by Jean Khalfa xiii
Preface to the 1961 edition xxvii
Preface to the 1972 edition xxxvii
PART ONE
I Stultifera Navis 3
II The great confinement 44
III The correctional world 78
IV Experiences of madness 108
V The insane 132
PART TWO
Introduction 163
I The madman in the garden of species 175
II The transcendence of delirium 208
III Figures of madness 251
IV Doctors and patients 297
viii contents
PART THREE
Introduction 343
I The great fear 353
II The new division 381
III The proper use of liberty 419
IV Birth of the asylum 463
V The anthropological circle 512
APPENDICES
I Madness, the absence of an œuvre. Appendix I of 1972
edition 541
II My body, this paper, this fire. Appendix II of 1972 edition 550
III Reply to Derrida (‘Michel Foucault Derrida e no kaino’.
Paideia (Tokyo) February 1972) 575
Endnotes 591
ANNEXES
I Documents 649
II Foucault’s original bibliography 665
III Bibliography of English works quoted in this translation 674
IV Critical bibliography on Foucault’s History of Madness 677
Index 695