This is very interesting – the discovery of typescript versions of Foucault’s History of Madness and introduction and translation of Kant’s Anthropology, annotated by Foucault –
Emmanuel le Doeff, À la découverte des thèses annotées de Michel Foucault
(open access, in French; some good images of pages)
When I was researching The Early Foucault, I was curious about the early versions of Folie et déraison, but there was no typescript of this kind in Foucault’s own archive, or in Canguilhem’s. I did manage to see a copy of the printed text bound for the defence, which was the same as the 1961 Plon version except for the cover and endpapers. The history of the book’s printing and variants still causes confusion – there is a list of the different versions here. The version discussed in the above article obviously precedes all of these printed versions – a fascinating addition to the story of this text.
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“Bataille rails against the Lord God once again. If only it had some effect.”
https://www.jhiblog.org/2025/03/05/the-other-bataille-an-interview-with-benjamin-noys-and-alberto-toscano/
Hi Stuart … been a while since we’ve been in touch. Thanks for posting this. As it turns out, I’m working right now on something closely related. I’ve left this same note on the Panacée site, asking why Le Doeuff, when referring to the handwritten annotation on p. 135 of the recently discovered typescript, says “annotation not retained in the publication.” It is true that the annotation does not appear in chapter 3, “The Correctional World,” of Histoire de la folie, as it does on the typescript. However, Foucault did retain it, but he moved it to a footnote in the chapter, “The New Division.” In Histoire de la folie (Gallimard Tel), it appears on p. 410; in the full English translation, it is on p. 633. I don’t have the 1961 Plon edition in front of me, but I’m going to guess that Foucault moved the handwritten annotation from the typescript into the footnotes for the 1961 publication. And the annotation, of course, is a quotation from archival sources on Mathurin Milan, “the oddball usurer,” who will later also make an appearance in “Lives of Infamous Men.”
Thank you Steven. It would be very interesting to compare this typescript with the published book. The 1961 book is almost the same as the 1972 one – except of course for the preface and the two appendices. The only change I’ve spotted is one missing footnote (1961, 620 n. 1) which is absent from the later French versions but in the English translation (642-3 n. 8). So I think you’re right that in all published versions the passage you mention is in a note.
Thanks, Stuart, good to hear I may be on the right track. I don’t suppose you happen to have the 1961 book to hand, do you? If you did, would you be able to confirm whether the passage appears in the footnotes and on what page? In the Gallimard/Tel edition it’s on p. 410 (footnotes to the chapter “The New Division”), but I’m assuming the pagination is different between the 1961 edition and the 1970s editions. Thank you …
No, sorry, I don’t have a copy with me (I’m based in New York this semester). Yes, the pagination is different. I only have a pdf of the Tel reprint.
Ah, thanks for letting me know. I also have the Tel reprint. I will keep looking …
Copies of the original 1961 edition are not cheap, as you’d expect. But there are more copies of the 1964 reprint of that edition (exactly the same, apart from the date) in circulation. But the abridged 1964 edition sometimes gets confused with it in library catalogues and second-hand stores. I have all three, as well as later reprints, but the 1961 edition is missing the dust-jacket.
Greetings,
Thank you Mr Elden for forwarding our post. And thank you Mr Maynard for pointing out this issue. We checked both the 1961 Plon edition and the 1972 Gallimard edition, and things are as you suspected : the quotation appears indeed in a footnote in the chapter titled “Le grand partage = The new Division”. We modified our post accordingly. This shows the merit of calling upon the erudition of the foucaldians’ community to reread this work in a version that was previously unknown! T. Lesage and E. Le Doeuff
Thank you for the reply, Emmanuel. It really is an exciting discovery, and I’m pleased to have enabled the contact between you and Steven.