The Passion of Michel FoucaultShortly before his death in 1984, Michel Foucault defended his career as one of the most controversial thinkers of our time. "The philosophical life", he declared, "is the animality of being human, renewed as a challenge, practiced as an exercise - and thrown in the face of others as a scandal". Now, for the first time, here is a book that explores the true challenge - and "scandal" - of Foucault's life and work. Based on extensive new research and a bold reinterpretation of the man and his texts, The Passion of Michel Foucault is a startling look at one of this century's most influential philosophers. It chronicles every stage of Foucault's personal and professional odyssey, from his early interest in dreams to his final preoccupation with sexuality and the nature of personal identity. Exploring the wider context of his work, it conjures up the heyday of structuralism in Paris and the electrifying chaos of the strikes in May 1968. It recounts Foucault's debates with Jean-Paul Sartre and Jacques Derrida, and his encounters with Noam Chomsky and Jurgen Habermas. And in revelations as fascinating as they may be shocking to some readers, The Passion of Michel Foucault provides the first detailed account of Foucault's lifelong obsession with death, suicide, drugs, and sadomasochistic eroticism - even under the mounting threat of AIDS in the 1980s. With the subtlety and sure grasp of history, politics, and philosophy that have marked his earlier books, James Miller has written a landmark study sure to provoke debate among readers everywhere. |
From inside the book
Results 1-3 of 53
Page 5
... talk ; my inquiry would prove futile . Since then , one useful biography of Foucault , by Didier Eribon , has already appeared , and still another , by David Macey , was being prepared as I wrote . To my own surprise , I was able to talk ...
... talk ; my inquiry would prove futile . Since then , one useful biography of Foucault , by Didier Eribon , has already appeared , and still another , by David Macey , was being prepared as I wrote . To my own surprise , I was able to talk ...
Page 280
... talk about Sade - even though it was well past the time when , if you read his books , he should have been concerned about Sade . But in his personal life , in his sexual life , he was still very concerned with Sade . " Our ...
... talk about Sade - even though it was well past the time when , if you read his books , he should have been concerned about Sade . But in his personal life , in his sexual life , he was still very concerned with Sade . " Our ...
Page 304
... talk . " If it is neces- sary to pose the question of the understanding in its relation to dom- ination " and by 1978 , he evidently thought that it was - then “ it must above all be by starting from a certain decisive will not to be ...
... talk . " If it is neces- sary to pose the question of the understanding in its relation to dom- ination " and by 1978 , he evidently thought that it was - then “ it must above all be by starting from a certain decisive will not to be ...
Contents
Preface | 5 |
THE DEATH OF THE AUTHOR | 13 |
WAITING FOR GODOT | 37 |
Copyright | |
7 other sections not shown
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
André Glucksmann appeared Artaud Barraqué Bataille become Bersani Binswanger Blanchot body CF int Collège de France critical critique cruelty culture daimon Daniel Defert death Discipline and Punish discourse dream Edmund White Eribon erotic essay experience explained fantasies French Friedrich Nietzsche Georges Bataille Gilles Deleuze Glucksmann Guibert Habermas Heidegger Heidegger's Hervé Guibert History of Sexuality homosexual human Ibid idea imagination intellectual interview Jean Kant Kant's kind labyrinth language later Le Nouvel Observateur lectures liberation limit-experience Madness and Civilization Maoist March Maurice Blanchot Michel Foucault modern moral Nietzsche's novel one's Order of Things Paris perhaps philosopher Pierre pleasure political possible practice prison published question reason recalls remarked revealing revolution Robbe-Grillet Roussel Sade Sartre Sartre's seemed social society struggle suicide thinker thought torture trans transgression truth Wade writing wrote York