«Courage of truth» and «care of the self» Foucault (objection Lorenzo
Bernini)

The paper addresses the meanings of the notion parrhesia (the
courage of truth), as well as how it is related to the concept epimeleia heautou,
or care of the self explored in Paul-Michel Foucault’s final course lectured by
him in the Collège de France in 1981-1984. The author refers to the interpretation
of Foucault’s views by the contemporary scholar from Verona. According
to Bernini’s interpretation, Foucault’s interest in parrhesia was caused by his
disappointment in the ethics of the care of the self. As Lorenzo Bernini says: In
The Hermeneutics of the Subject Foucault had to admit, in spite of himself, that
in the Hellenistic Age and in the Roman Imperial period the “culture of the self”
froze into a universal normative morality that disclosed the Christian hermeneutic
of desire and thus modern subjectivity. In the lectures at the Collège de
France of the following years, he sought after the origins of an alternative tradition
to which, he supposed, both the Enlightenment and his own critical attitude
belonged; and he found it not in cura sui but in parrhesìa. In this way, Foucault
abandoned the hypothesis that different historical systems of thought are incommensurable,
and he ascertained that from the beginning – at least in the
Western tradition – subjectivity is compelled to make a choice between an epistemic
and an ethical approach to truth, between the will to knowledge and the
will to freedom. In so doing, he opened a new field of research, which this conference
contributes to promote and develop further. Although, one cannot discover
any substantiation for this interpretation in the Foucault’s texts. The care
of the self and courage of truth emerge not as alternatives in his works but rather
tightly intertwined notions and interdependent strategies for building up subjectivity.
The two different ways for the care of the self problem statement in
Alcibiades I and Laches (what L. Bernini pointed out) do not indicate at the
alternative of the care of the self and courage of truth. Quite the opposite, M.
Foucault attempts to show that in the Laches where the primary concern for the
care of the self is bios, parrhesia is immediately involved: bios acts both as the
subject of the care of the self and continuous topic of Socrates’ parrheisiastic
speech. Namely, this sphere (life style, how we conduct our lives, care of the
self) makes the primary space for parrheisiastic practices, intelligible in its ethic
per se and political meaning. Paul-Michel Foucalt stresses that he is interested
not so much in the political as, peculiarly, in ethic parrhesia, which attracts him
as the space and practice for constituting oneself and genuine care of the self.