The History of Sexuality: The Care of the Self

by Michel Foucault, Robert Hurley (Translator)

Overview

Michel Foucault takes us into the first two centuries of our own era, into the Golden Age of Rome, to reveal a subtle but decisive break from the classical Greek vision of sexual pleasure. He skillfully explores the whole corpus of moral reflection among philosophers (Plutarch, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Seneca) and physicians of the era, and uncovers an increasing mistrust of pleasure and growing anxiety over sexual activity and its consequences.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780394741550
Publisher:	Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication date:	11/28/1988
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	101,896
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Michel Foucault was born in Poitiers, France, in 1926. He lecturerd in universities throughout the world; served as director at the Institut Francais in Hamburg, Germany and at the Institut de Philosophi at the Faculte des Lettres in the University of Clermont-Ferrand, France; and wrote frequently for French newspapers and reviews. At the time of his death in 1984, he held a chair at France's most prestigious institutions, the College de France.

Table of Contents

	Translator's Acknowledgments	vii
Part 1	Dreaming of One's Pleasures	1
Chapter 1	The Method of Artemidorus	4
Chapter 2	The Analysis	17
Chapter 3	Dream and Act	26
Part 2	The Cultivation of the Self	37
Part 3	Self and Others	69
Chapter 1	The Marital Role	72
Chapter 2	The Political Game	81
Part 4	The Body	97
Chapter 1	Galen	105
Chapter 2	Are They Good? Are They Bad?	112
Chapter 3	The Regimen of Pleasures	124
Chapter 4	The Work of the Soul	133
Part 5	The Wife	145
Chapter 1	The Marriage Tie	150
Chapter 2	The Question of Monopoly	165
Chapter 3	The Pleasures of Marriage	176
Part 6	Boys	187
Chapter 1	Plutarch	193
Chapter 2	Pseudo-Lucian	211
Chapter 3	A New Erotics	228
	Conclusion	233
	Notes	241
	Bibliography	257
	Index	267

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"The Care of the Self shares with the writings on which it draws the characteristic of being carefully constructed, exquisitely reasoned and internally cogent." — The New York Times Book Review

"Foucault is a thinker from whose writing one can infer lessons for our modern lives and dilemmas."— Boston Globe

Editorial Reviews

"The Care of the Self shares with the writings on which it draws the characteristic of being carefully constructed, exquisitely reasoned and internally cogent." — The New York Times Book Review

"Foucault is a thinker from whose writing one can infer lessons for our modern lives and dilemmas."— Boston Globe

From the Publisher

In this absorbing study, Foucault discusses the attitudes toward sexuality prevalent in Hellenistic Greece and Rome. Classical Greece's view of sex as a means of obtaining individual pleasure faced increasing challenge in Hellenistic times. The love of boys now assumed more muted tones, often finding itself at odds with the highly valued ideals of marital fidelity and virginity. The Stoic approach, as Foucault demonstrates in a nuanced discussion, both resembled and differed from the asceticism of Christianity. This volume, perhaps the last that will appear of the author's posthumous History of Sexuality ( LJ 10/15/78; 12/1/85) manifests Foucault's powerful analytic ability. Though at times it draws very broad conclusions from the discussion of relatively few texts, it is still highly recommended. David Gordon, Social Philosophy & Policy Ctr., Bowling Green State Univ., Ohio

Library Journal