I'm not sure I like the implications of what Ferda writes below. Some of
us don't happen to think the guy was "fucked up." People who would
dismiss his work out of hand because he wasn't a 'straight family man'
are wrong to do so, of course. But that doesn't mean that who he was was
something totally disconnected from what he wrote. If, as he claimed,
one "writes to become something other than what one is," it would seem
to follow that one's life is necessarily wrapped up in one's writings.
The conclusion to be had is neither for people who thought his life was
"fucked up" to dismiss his work out of hand nor for those who thought
his life was just fine to unquestioningly endorse his writings simply
because they endorsed his life. But let's get clear about the fact that
much of his life - his experience, who he was and who he was in the
process of becoming - is represented in his writings. How could it be
otherwise? Do you suppose he wrote from some "neutral" place? Have you
*read* his work denying the very possibility of that neutrality?
Blaine Rehkopf
Philosophy
York University
Canada
In your message of 1:19 Nov 9 1996, you write:
> >
> > It seems that in some respects Foucault's work is the
> >historico-philosophical application of ideas and interests that occurred
> >within the framework of Foucault's life alone. Foucault was writing an
> >applied version of himself.
> >
> > Nicholas
> >
>
> This is probably the most dangerous interpretation of Foucault's work.
> Such interpretations lead to such disasters as James Miller's "The
> Passion of Michel Foucault" and to excuses to dismiss the ethical/political
> substance and implications of his work (just another version of "the
> argumentum ad hominem": the guy was fucked up, so was the work!)
> What if we knew nothing about Foucault's private life? Would we have less
> to say about his work than we do about Blanchot's?
>
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