Yvon Brès: Philosopher, Psychologist, Teacher (On the Occasion of the 90th Birthday)

Abstract

Yvon Brès (born in 1927), barely known in Russia, is a significant figure in many areas of culture in France. Dozens of dissertations were written under his academic advising. He is (since 1972) the editor-in-chief of the Revue philosophique de la France et de l’étranger, the oldest philosophical journal in France, since 1970, he has been professor (now emeritus) of the university Paris-VII which was the first in France to introduce psychoanalysis into university curriculum. His doctoral dissertation dealt with “Plato’s psychology”; he also authored a number of monographs on interaction between philosophy, psychology, and psychoanalysis. Сontrary to perception of Freud’s ideas as an epistemological revolution associated with the discovery of the unconscious, he showed that, taking Freud as a starting point but not confining oneself to interpretations offered by him, we are able to find out the cultural persistence and at the same time actuality of a whole series of philosophical and religious issues, even though they are formulated differently in different epochs. This is what Yvon Brès’s main books are about.