Summary of Michel Foucault's Discipline and Punish

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.

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#1 The execution of Damiens the regicide was recorded by Bouton, an officer of the watch. He was quartered, which meant his flesh was torn apart by red-hot pincers, his right hand holding the knife with which he had committed the parricide.

#2 The executioner, Samson, told the court that there was no hope of succeeding. He asked their lordships if they wanted him to have the prisoner cut into pieces. The clerk of the court, Monsieur Le Breton, asked them again, and again the patient said no. The four limbs were then pulled away, and the trunk and the rest were covered with logs and faggots and fire was put to them.

#3 The French prison system was based on the Léon Faucher rules, which were written in 1833. The prisoners’ day began at six in the morning in winter and five in summer. They worked for nine hours a day, two hours a day was devoted to instruction, and work ended at nine o’clock in winter and eight in summer.

#4 The prison time-table of 1786 defines a certain penal style. It was a time when Europe and the United States re-organized their economy of punishment. They eliminated torture as a public spectacle, and replaced it with less physical forms of punishment.

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E-kirja: 29. maaliskuuta 2022