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Louis Althusser: the story on HearLore | HearLore
— Ch. 1 · Colonial Origins And Early Life —
Louis Althusser.
~9 min read · Ch. 1 of 7
Louis Pierre Althusser was born on the 16th of October 1918 in Birmendreïs, a small town near Algiers in French Algeria. His family belonged to the pied-noir community, descendants of European settlers who had lived in North Africa for generations. The son of Charles-Joseph Althusser, a lieutenant in the French army and bank clerk, and Lucienne Marthe Berger, a devout Catholic schoolteacher, Louis grew up in what he later described as a prosperous colonial childhood. Historian Martin Jay noted that Althusser shared this background with Albert Camus and Jacques Derrida, calling them all products of French colonial culture in Northern Africa.
In 1930, his family relocated to Marseille when his father took a position as director of the Compagnie Algérienne bank branch there. Young Louis excelled academically during these years and joined a scout group, showing early signs of intellectual promise. A second move occurred in 1936 when he settled in Lyon to attend the Lycée du Parc. It was at this lycée where Catholic professors profoundly influenced his thinking. He joined the Jeunesse Étudiante Chrétienne youth movement and even considered becoming a Trappist monk before eventually turning toward communism.
His interest in Catholicism persisted alongside his growing communist ideology, creating an unusual synthesis that would shape his philosophical approach. Critics have argued that this early religious formation affected how he interpreted Karl Marx's work. After two years of preparation under Jean Guitton, Althusser gained admission to the École Normale Supérieure in Paris in July 1939. However, his attendance was immediately deferred due to being drafted into the French Army in September of that year.
Prisoner Of War And Communist Awakening
Seized by German forces in Vannes in June 1940, Althusser spent five years imprisoned in a prisoner-of-war camp located in Schleswig-Holstein, Northern Germany. During his captivity, he initially performed hard labor but was reassigned to work in the infirmary after falling ill. This medical assignment gave him time to read philosophy and literature, fundamentally altering his intellectual trajectory.
In his memoirs, Althusser described the prison camp experience as the moment he first understood communism. He recalled hearing Marxism discussed by a Parisian lawyer who passed through the camp and meeting actual communists for the first time. The solidarity, political action, and community he witnessed among prisoners became foundational to his worldview. Psychoanalyst Élisabeth Roudinesco later argued that this absurd war experience was essential for developing his philosophical thought.
The trauma of captivity also triggered lifelong mental instability, manifesting as constant depression that persisted until his death. After the war ended, Althusser resumed his studies at the ENS in 1945 to prepare for the agrégation examination required to teach philosophy in secondary schools. In 1946, he met Hélène Rytmann, a Jewish former French Resistance member with whom he would maintain a relationship until killing her in 1980. That same year, he began a close friendship with Jacques Martin, translator of Hegel and Hesse, who would later commit suicide and whose influence shaped Althusser's reading of German Idealism.
Louis Pierre Althusser was born on the 16th of October 1918 in Birmendreïs, a small town near Algiers in French Algeria. His family belonged to the pied-noir community, descendants of European settlers who had lived in North Africa for generations.
How did Louis Althusser's imprisonment during World War II influence his philosophy?
Althusser spent five years imprisoned in a prisoner-of-war camp located in Schleswig-Holstein, Northern Germany from June 1940 until after the war ended. During his captivity, he read philosophy and literature which fundamentally altered his intellectual trajectory and led him to first understand communism through discussions with other prisoners.
What major event caused Louis Althusser to be removed from his teaching position at the École Normale Supérieure?
On the 16th of November 1980, Louis Althusser strangled his wife Hélène Rytmann within their ENS room while suffering from an acute melancholy crisis. A February 1981 court ruled mental irresponsibility preventing prosecution while confinement warrant issued by Paris police prefecture mandated retirement from ENS.
When did Louis Althusser publish Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses?
Louis Althusser published Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses in La Pensée journal in 1970. This essay established his theory of how society constructs individuals as subjects through ideological state apparatuses including family, media, religious organizations, and the education system.
How old was Louis Althusser when he died and what were the circumstances?
Louis Althusser died on the 22nd of October 1990 following a heart attack contracted during pneumonia treatment at the MGEN institution La Verrière. He had been hospitalized since early 1983 after strangling his wife and spent most of his final years in psychiatric clinics under constant medical supervision.
Althusser resumed publishing Marxist-related works in 1960 when he translated and edited a collection directed by Hyppolite about Ludwig Feuerbach's writings. This project aimed to identify Feuerbach's influence on Marx's early texts while contrasting it with the absence of such thought in Marx's mature works. The effort inspired him to write "On the Young Marx: Theoretical Questions" in 1961, published in La Pensée journal, which became the first article in what would become his most famous book For Marx.
His articles inflamed French debates on Marx and Marxist philosophy, gaining considerable support among intellectuals. Inspired by this recognition, Althusser began publishing more extensively on Marxist thought. In 1964, he released an article titled "Freud and Lacan" in La Nouvelle Critique, significantly influencing Freudo-Marxist theory. He also invited Jacques Lacan to lecture on Baruch Spinoza and psychoanalytic concepts at the ENS.
The impact of these publications led Althusser to transform his teaching style at the École Normale Supérieure. He conducted seminars covering topics like "On the Young Marx" from 1961 to 1962, "The Origins of Structuralism" during 1962-1963 focusing on Foucault's History of Madness, and "Lacan and Psychoanalysis" between 1963 and 1964. These seminars aimed for a return to Marx and attracted new generations of students. Both For Marx (published 1965) and Reading Capital (co-authored with students, also 1965) brought international fame despite widespread criticism. They made Althusser one of the leading theoreticians within the PCF while establishing him as a structural Marxist against humanist interpretations.
Ideology And The Epistemological Break
Althusser argued that Marx's thought contained a radical epistemological break occurring around 1845, separating early writings from mature works. This break represented a shift to fundamentally different propositions and theoretical frameworks rather than a coherent whole. He believed Marx himself did not fully comprehend the significance of this transformation, expressing it only obliquely through what he called symptomatic reading.
His essay On the Materialist Dialectic proposed that historical materialism constituted a science with its own internal methods of proof, distinct from ideology or politics. Unlike empiricism, which assumes direct engagement with reality, Althusser claimed Marx developed knowledge as theoretical practice entirely within thought itself. Knowledge emerged through three generalities: raw pre-scientific ideas, conceptual frameworks applied to them, and transformed concrete knowledge products.
In Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses published in La Pensée journal in 1970, Althusser established his theory of how society constructs individuals as subjects. He described ideological state apparatuses including family, media, religious organizations, and crucially the education system. These institutions impose upon people the role of being responsible agents who believe they act freely while actually following predetermined social patterns.
Althusser illustrated this concept through interpellation, comparing ideology to a policeman shouting "Hey you there!" on a street. When someone turns around responding to the call, they become a subject recognizing themselves as addressed by authority. This recognition happens retroactively because every individual is already an ideological subject before birth. The process creates mis-recognition where material individuals transform into free agents assuming responsibility for acts determined by social structures.
May Sixty-Eight And Political Isolation
During May 1968, when tumultuous protests swept France, Althusser was hospitalized due to depressive breakdown and absent from the Latin Quarter events. Many students participated actively, with Régis Debray becoming an international celebrity revolutionary. Protesters wrote on walls asking what use Althusser served given his absence from the movement.
His initial silence drew criticism, yet he remained ambivalent about the uprising. While not supporting the movement directly, he criticized it as an ideological revolt of the masses adopting PCF arguments calling it an infantile disorder of anarchistic utopianism infiltrating student ranks. Simultaneously, he called May 1968 the most significant event in Western history since the Resistance and victory over Nazism, attempting to reconcile students with the Communist Party.
Maoist journal La Cause du peuple labeled him revisionist while former students like Jacques Rancière condemned his position. Following this backlash, Althusser underwent self-criticism resulting in Essays in Self-criticism published in 1974. In this work, he revisited old positions including support for Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia. By 1969, he began developing Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses which became extremely influential on ideology discussions when published in La Pensée in 1970.
In early 1970s, the PCF faced internal conflicts regarding strategic orientation against emerging Eurocommunism trends. Althusserian structuralist Marxism represented one defined strategic line within these debates. He participated in public events like the 1973 debate Communists, Intellectuals and Culture contesting party leadership decisions abandoning dictatorship of proletariat concept during their twenty-second congress in 1976.
The Murder Of Hélène Rytmann
After the PCF and left lost French legislative elections in 1978, Althusser's depression intensified significantly. In March 1980, he interrupted an École Freudienne de Paris session calling Lacan a beautiful and pitiful harlequin before undergoing hiatal hernia surgery that caused breathing difficulties. According to Althusser himself, the operation deteriorated his physical and mental state further, developing persecution complexes and suicidal thoughts.
He spent most summer months hospitalized in a Parisian clinic without improvement. Upon returning home in early October, he wanted distance from ENS even proposing buying psychiatrist René Diatkine's house. The couple convinced themselves about human decline attempting contact with Pope John Paul II through former professor Jean Guitton. Most time passed locked inside their ENS apartment until fall 1980 when psychiatrist Diatkine recommended hospitalization despite refusal by both partners.
On the 16th of November 1980, Althusser strangled Hélène Rytmann within their ENS room. He reported the murder to resident doctor who contacted psychiatric institutions immediately. Before police arrived, hospital directors decided to admit him to Sainte-Anne hospital conducting psychiatric examination. Assessment concluded he should not face criminal charges under article 64 of French Penal Code stating no crime exists where suspect suffered dementia during action.
The report stated Althusser killed Rytmann during acute melancholy crisis without realizing it, describing wife-murder by manual strangulation as committed within iatrogenic hallucinatory episode complicated by depression. Resulting loss of civil rights placed him under legal representative restriction forbidding document signing. February 1981 court ruled mental irresponsibility preventing prosecution while confinement warrant issued by Paris police prefecture mandated retirement from ENS.
Mental Illness And Autobiographical Legacy
Following the murder, Althusser lived various public and private clinics until becoming voluntary patient in 1983. During this period starting 1982, he began writing an untitled manuscript later published as The Underground Current of Materialism of Encounter. From 1984 to 1986, confined mostly to a north Paris apartment, he received visits from philosopher Stanislas Breton converted into mystic monk by Roudinesco and Mexican philosopher Fernanda Navarro spending six months beginning winter 1984.
Althusser exchanged letters with Navarro until February 1987 writing preface July 1986 for Filosofía y marxismo collection released Mexico 1988. These interviews and correspondence appeared France 1994 as Sur la philosophie formulating materialism of encounter or aleatory materialism concepts first appearing Écrits philosophiques et politiques I 1994 then 2006 Verso book Philosophy of Encounter.
In emergency operation 1987 due to esophagus obstruction, depression developed new clinical case transferring Soisy-sur-Seine clinic then MGEN institution La Verrière where pneumonia contracted summer led heart attack death the 22nd of October 1990. Throughout life, Althusser underwent psychiatric hospitalizations including schizophrenia diagnosis initially suffering bipolar disorder causing frequent depressions starting 1938 becoming regular after five-year German captivity.
From 1950s onward constant medical supervision included electroconvulsive therapy narco-analysis psychoanalysis most aggressive treatments post-war French psychiatry offered. Main analyst René Diatkine began sessions January 1965 following dream killing sister launching real unconscious exploration June. By July 1966 treatment produced spectacular results despite occasional ridicule attempts giving Lacanian lessons. In 1976 estimated fifteen previous thirty years spent hospitals clinics analyzing illness prerequisites complex family relationships devoting half autobiography topic.