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The Symbolic, the Imagrnary, and the Real

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The Symbolic, the Imagrnary, and the Real The Symbolic,the Imagrnary,and the Real : Inauguralmeeting of SFP,Paris : 8tl'July 1953: JacquesLacan P1-52of On the Names-of-the-Father: Jacques Lacan. translatedby BruceFink JacquesLacan spoke on "The Synrbolic,the Imaginary, and the Real" immediately beforewriting the so-calledRome Report on "The Functionand Field of Speechand Langua-eein Psychoanalysis"(published in theEcrits) during the summerof 1953,a paperthat markedthe publicdebut of "Lacan'steaching," as it was latercalled. The earliertalk includedthe first thematicpresentation of the famoustriad that undergirdedall of Lacan'swork for the next threedecades and that went on to becomeits essentialobject - not merelya conceptualobject, but a mathematicaland materialone as well in the form of the Borromeanknot andits derivatives. Publishedin Frenchat EcoleLacanienne de Psychanalyse - Pas tout Lacan - 1950i1959: ,. ", Available, ,".,,.http.//wu'w.ecole-lacanienne.net/documents/1953-07-08.doc Cetteconferer'rce ( Le.symbolique,l'imagirtaire el le reel r.firtpronortceele Bjuillet 1953pourout'rir les actit,itesde la Societt.fi'curEctisede Psvchcuralvse. Cette versirtrt e.stannoncee dans le cataloguede la Biblirfihit1uede I'e.l.p. contmever.sion J.L. Il existeplusieurs autres version.s,sensiblement di//erentes a certains endroits,dont une pante dan.sle Bulletinde l'Associationfreudienne, 1982, n" I. Referencesto SigmundFreud Wolf Man . The Historyof an InfantileNeurosis : 1918(SE XVII) RatMan : Notesupon a caseof Obsessionalneurosis . 1909 (SE X) Beyondthe pleasureprinciple 1920(SE XVIII) My friends, you can see that, for the first so- called scientific presentation of our new Sociery, I have selecteda title that is quite ambitious. I will thus begin first by apologizing for it, asking you to consider this presentation both as a summary of viewpoints that those here who are my students know well, with which they have become familiar over the past two years through my teaching, and also as a sort of preface or introduction to a certain orientation for studying psychoanalysis. Indeed, I believe that the return to Freud's texts which my teaching has focused on for the past rwo years has convinced me - or rather us, all of us who have worked together - that there is no firmer grasp on human reality than that provided by Freudian psychoanalysis and that one must return to the source and apprehend, in every senseof the word, these texts. One cannot escape the conclusion that psy- choanalytic theory, and at the same time its technique, which form but one and the same thing, have undergone a sort of shrinkage and, to be quite frank, decay.For, in effect, it is not easy to remain at the level of such fullness. 'S7olf Take, for example, a tefi like that of the I SYMBOLIC, THE IMAGINARY, AND THE REAL THE SYMBOLIC, THE IMAGINARY, AND THE REAL }.IL, Man lTbe History of an Infantile Neurosis(r9r8), I SE XWII. I thought of taking it this eveningas a basisfor and as an exampleof what I wish to ( )ne thing cannot escape us at the outset that there is in analysisa whole Portion presentto you. But although I gave a Seminar 'r,rrnely, on it last year, I spent the entire day yesterday .rf our subjects' realiry Lriell that escapesus. It rereadingthe caseand quite simply had the feel- .lid not escapeFreud when he was dealing with just ing that it was impossible to give you even an crrchof his patients, but, of course' it was as approximateidea of it hereand that therewas but tl-roroughlybeyond his graspand scope. 'We one thing to be done - to givelast year's Seminar should be struck by the way in which he againnext year. speaks of the Rat Man, setting him apaft from Indeed,what I perceivedin this incrediblerexr, his other patients. He concludes that he can see "fine, after the work and progresswe made this year on in him the personaliry of a intelligent, and him with other the caseof the Rat Man lNotes Upon a Caseof cultured man," and he contrasts ObsessionalNeurosis (t9o), SE X], leads me to patients he has worked with. This is not so much \Wolf think that what I stressedlast year as rhe crux, the case when he speal<sof the Man, but example,or typically characteristicthought fur- he mentions it nevertheless. Still, we are not nishedby this extraordinarytext was but a simple required to endorse all of his appraisals.The Wolf "approach,"as the Anglo-Saxonssay - in other Man does not seem to have had quite as much words, a first step. The upshot being that this class as the Rat Man. Yet it is striking that Freud eveningI will merely try to compareand contrast singled him out as a special case.Not to mention briefly the three quite distinct registersthat are Dora, about whom we can virtually say that he essentialregisters of human realiry: the symbolic, loved her. the imaginary, and the real. This direct element,whereby Freud weighsand appraisespersonalities, cannot fail to strike us. It is something that we deal with all the time in the registerof morbidiry, on the one hand, and THE SYMBOLIC, THE IMAGINARY, AND THE REAL I'HE SYMBOLIC, THE IMAGINARY' AND THE REAL even in the register of psychoanalyticpracrice, .rnalysis?Certainly not - it is indisputablysome- with subjectswho do not fall completely into rhing else.This is a questionwe askourselves all the morbid category. It is an element that we the time, and that is raisedby all thosewho try must dways reservejudgment about and that is to formulate a theory of psychoanalyticpractice especiallyprominent to thoseof us who bearthe lexpirience].W-hat is this practice, which is so heavyburden of choosingamong rhosewho wish different from all others and brings about such to go into analysisin order to undergo training prrofoundtransformations in people?What are as analysts. rhosetransformations? tVhat is their mainspring? \(rhat can we say in the end, after our selec- For yearsthe developmentof psychoanalytic tion hasbeen made? Consider the criteria that are theoryhas been designed to answerthis question. 'lhe mentioned- must someonebe neurotic in order averageperson or man in the streetdoes not to be a good analyst?A little bit neurotic?Highly seem terribly astonishedby the effectivenessof neurotic?Certainly not, but what about nor ar this practicethat occursentirely through speech- all neurotic? In the final reckoninB, is this what And he is, in the end, quite right, for indeed it guides us in a judgment that no rexr can define works,and it would seemthat, in orderto explain and which leads us to appraisepersonal quali- it, we needfirst but demonstrateits movementby ties? In other words, do we rely on the realiry working. To speakis alreadyto go to the heart of expressedby the following - that a subject either psychoanalyticexperience. Here it makes sense has the right stuff or he doesn'r,that he is, as rhe to first raisea question:What is speech?In other Chinese say,xian da, aworthy man, or, xiao ren, words,what aresymbols? an unworthy man? This is certainly something In truth, we witness an avoidance of this that constitutesthe limits of our experience. question.And we note that in minimizing this Vhat is brought into play in analysis?Is it question- in seeingin the strictly technicalele- a real relation to the subject, namely, to recog- mentsand mainspringsof analysisnothing more nize his realiry in a certain way and according to than instrumentsdesigned to modify, through a our own measures?Is that what we deal with in seriesof successiveapproximations, the subiect's THE SYMBOLIC, THE IMAGINARY, AND THE REAL 'fHE SYMBOLIC, THE IMAGINARY, AND THE RE,AL 'W.hat behaviorsand habits - we are led very quickly to rhe experienceof speakinginvolve? is the a number of difficultiesand deadends. Going in cssenceand exchangeof speech?And to raise at this direction, we cerrainly don', go to the point the same time the question of psychoanalytic of situating them in a global considerationof lrractice lexpirience). psychoanalyricpractice, but we go ever further Let us begin with this practice as it is initially toward a cemain number of opacities that arise presentedto us in the first theoriesof analysis. and that then tend ro rurn analysisinto a practice What is this neuroticwhom we deal with in psy- that seemsfar more irrational than it realiy is. choandysis?W-hat is going to happen during the It is striking tWhat ro see how many subjectswho analysis? about the shift [in focus] from the have recently engagedin analysishave talked, in consciousto the unconscious?Vhat arethe forces their first way of expressingthemselves regard- that give a certain existenceto the equilibrium we ing their experience,about its possiblyirrational call the pleasureprinciple? character,whereas it seems,on the contrary, that To proceedquickly, I will saywith Raymond de there is perhaps no more ffansparent technique Saussurethat the subjecthallucinates his world. around. The subject's illusory satisfactionsare obviously Of course,in an analysiseveryrhing goes in this of a different order than the satisfactionsthat find direction: we fall in with a certain number of the their object purely and simply in reality lriell. A patient's more or lesspartid psychologicarviews, symptom has never satedhunger or slakedthirst we speakabout magicalthinking, we speakabout in a lasting manner, unlessaccompanied by the all kinds of registersthat indisputabllhave their absorptionof food or drink. No doubt a general valueand areencounrered in a very dynamic fash- decline in the subject'slevel of vitaliry can result ion in psychoanalysis.There is but one step from in extremecases, as we seefor examplein natural that to thinking that psychoanalysisitseli oper- or artificial hibernation, but this is conceivable atesin the registerof magical thinking, and this only as a phasethat cannot last without leading step is quickly taken when one does nor decide to irreversible damage.The very reversibiliry of 'what first to raisethe primordial question: does a neurotic problem implies that the economy of 'I'HE AND THE REAL THE SYMBOLIC.
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