It’s officially published tomorrow, but I’ve just picked up a copy of the fourth volume of Foucault’s History of Sexuality – Les Aveux de la chair [Confessions, or Avowals, of the Flesh]. Some of the book is available to view here (essentially just the editor Frédéric Gros’s foreword). The back cover simply has the line of René Char that appeared on volumes II and III. “The history of men is the long succession of synonyms of the same term [vocable]. To contradict them is a duty”.

The book is in three main parts – ‘The formation of a new experience’, ‘Being a virgin’ and ‘Being married’. It looks like the first and second titles are not Foucault’s own. There are some  ‘annexes’ of material appended to the main text – these are related texts found together with the main manuscript. Three are brief of 1, 3 or 7 pages, but Annex 2 is an extensive manuscript of 30 printed pages.

I’ve taken a photo of the table of contents, since that doesn’t seem to be available anywhere. I hope to write at least a review of the book in the near future.

Update: There is a Warwick news release with comments from me here