The History of Madness in the Classical Era

This book, which is part of the ambitious "archaeological" project of the French theorist and researcher Michel Foucault (1926–1984), is based on the doctoral dissertation he wrote after spending several years in psychiatric hospitals.

"The History of Madness in the Classical Era" (1961) is an attempt to analyze and interpret the representations of the essence of madness that prevailed in European culture from the 17th to the 19th centuries, undertaken to expose the genealogy of psychiatric practice in the 20th century.

Foucault, referring to medieval medical treatises, popular superstitions of the past, and literary images, asks how the perception of madness and the attitude towards it changed in society. How did madness become a disease subject to specialized treatment? How did the rational human being come into existence, capable of judging the madman?