By Sasha Brandt
On 10 July 1978, Michel Foucault sat down for an interview with Jean Le Bitoux, a conversation that would become the stuff of legend. Titled Le Gai Savoir (“The Gay Science”), the interview was intended for publication in Le Gai Pied (the magazine that was named by Foucault himself), one of the most intellectually rigorous and politically charged gay magazines of all times.
Michel Foucault, 1976.
Founded by Le Bitoux, Le Gai Pied was a rare publication that combined queer cultural discourse with serious political engagement. It featured interviews with figures such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Pierre Bérégovoy, François Mitterrand, Serge Gainsbourg, David Hockney, Barbara, Juliette Gréco, and Marguerite Duras. By the summer of 1978, the magazine was in its planning stages, though Le Bitoux anticipated resistance from the French authorities. To counter any potential suppression, he sought to fortify the magazine’s legitimacy by associating it with established intellectual voices.
It was in Foucault’s kitchen, in conversation with Daniel Defert, Le Bitoux, and Thierry Voeltzel, that the magazine found its name. Le Gai Pied, literally translating as “The Gay Foot,” was both playful and subversive. Foucault, recognising the project’s significance, lent his support by offering a contribution to the first issue, thereby giving the magazine a layer of intellectual protection.
In the unpublished interview, Le Bitoux and Foucault discussed the first volume of The History of Sexuality, which had been released two years earlier, along with Foucault’s reflections on gay politics, the movement’s trajectory, and the aesthetics of queer male culture. The conversation was strikingly intimate, offering an unguarded glimpse into Foucault’s thinking on sadomasochism, gay male sexual practices, and the radical potential of queer existence.
And yet, the interview never saw the light of day. At the last moment, Foucault called Le Bitoux and requested its withdrawal. In its place, he submitted Un Plaisir si simple (“Such a Simple Pleasure”), a brief meditation on homosexuality and suicide. His hesitation—whether driven by concerns over misinterpretation or fears of political and personal backlash—underscored the complexities of his position within the gay liberation movement. Some of his contemporaries considered him une honteuse—a “closet queen”—for his reluctance to openly discuss certain aspects of queer life. Given the cultural climate and the inevitable controversy that would have followed a discussion of bathhouses and fist-fucking, his caution was not unfounded.
The lost interview has remained elusive ever since, adding to its mystique. Now, 46 years later, it remains as compelling and urgent as ever.
For those eager to engage with this historical document, the full interview is available for download here: Le Gai Savoir.
Two years later, in 1980, Foucault did grant Le Gai Pied an interview that was published—Friendship as a Way of Life—a text that continues to resonate in contemporary queer discourse. Read it here: Friendship as a Way of Life.
Original page of Le Gai Pied No. 1, 1979, where Michel Foucault published.
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