From: "Clare O'Farrell" <c_ofarrell-AT-hotmail.com>
Subject: weird quotes from Foucault
Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 21:29:29 PDT


One of the things I enjoy about Foucault's work is his sense of irony. Here 
are a couple of things I read today where he invokes penitential ashes on 
his own head.

'I renounce all my public and private duties. Shame overwhelms me! I cover 
myself with ashes! I didn't know the date of [the invention of] the baby's 
dummy!' [tranlator's note: pacifier for Americans!]' (Le jeu de Michel 
Foucault, Dits et Ecrits vol 3, p.329)

'Me, I conduct myself in a quite unreasonable and pretentious way, under the 
guise of modesty, but it is pretention, presumption, a delirium of 
presumption almost in a hegelian sense, to speak about an unknown object 
with a non defined method. So I cover my head with ashes...' (Pouvoir et 
savoir, Dits et Ecrits vol 3, p.405)

Clare

Clare O'Farrell
email:c_ofarrell-AT-hotmail.com
web page: http://www.qut.edu.au/edu/cpol/foucault/


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