Writer and librarian who sought to reclaim Nietzsche from fascist appropriation with the secret society Acéphale and On Nietzsche
A graduate of the École des Chartes, he worked from 1924 as a librarian at the Bibliothèque nationale and as a young man learned Nietzsche from Lev Shestov. In the early 1930s he joined Boris Souvarine's Democratic Communist Circle, and in 1935 he led the anti-fascist group Contre-Attaque with André Breton. In 1936 he founded the secret society and review Acéphale, whose second issue (1937), "Nietzsche and the Fascists", sought to reclaim Nietzsche from Nazi appropriation, and during the war he wrote Inner Experience and On Nietzsche (1945). After the war he founded the review Critique, and in The Accursed Share (1949) outlined a "general economy" of the expenditure of surplus wealth. Dismissed by Sartre as a mystic, after his death he strongly influenced Foucault and Derrida.
Also known as: Georges Albert Maurice Victor Bataille
Activities and affiliations
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1924–1962
France state institutionsLibrarian, Bibliothèque nationale; head librarian at Carpentras and OrléansMain
Scholarship and theory
Career Timeline
- 1922Graduated from the École des Chartes
- 1924Librarian in the medals department of the Bibliothèque nationale
- 1929–1930Edited the review Documents
- 1931–1934Souvarine's Democratic Communist Circle; La Critique sociale
- 1935–1936Contre-Attaque with Breton
- 1936–1939The secret society and review Acéphale
- 1937Acéphale no. 2, "Nietzsche and the Fascists"
- 1937–1939College of Sociology
- 1943Inner Experience
- 1945On Nietzsche
- 1946Founded the review Critique
- 1949The Accursed Share; curator of the library at Carpentras
- 1951Head of the library at Orléans