Gaston Bachelard, a French philosopher, was born on June 27, 1884, in Bar-sur-Aube and died in Paris on October 16, 1962. He held a Ph.D. in philosophy and was a member of the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques. His career was far from ordinary. He was born into a family of modest means and began his professional life as a temporary employee in the postal service. In 1919 he became a teacher of physics and chemistry at the Bar-sur-Aube grammar school and prepared for his degree in philosophy, which he obtained in 1922. In 1927 he defended his doctoral dissertation and was appointed a professor of philosophy in 1930 at the University of Dijon and later at the Sorbonne (1940-1955). He received the Grand Prix National des Lettres in 1961.

His work is divided between considerations of the scientific mind, rationalism and the need for truth, and reflections on the imagination, daydreams, and poetry. Psychoanalysis, as...