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(All parts in English)

Who has read Amphitryon?

In truth, imitation during the classical period was pushed quite far, because when one reads Plautus’s version, one sees what Molière’s owes to it. And this is very well so; besides, if we were to decide to imitate more, we would probably be more original.

It is undoubtedly thanks to this that Molière’s play possesses its incredible virtues. And, all in all, since we are moving forward through the year, there must naturally be moments when we relax. In the final classes, those where we were read to, we had teachers who read Kipling to us in fifth grade—they had quite poor taste!—when there were so many more interesting things to read. But no matter, we were quite content.

I must still situate the problem for you: the story of Amphitryon. I let myself make an allusion to it…
“I let myself…”—my letting-go is rather peculiar!
…to give it a kind of slight touch in my response to the man with the histrionic neurosis.

That is to say, the myth of Amphitryon—it was with regard to this myth that I had tried to introduce, to make one feel the difference between the character and the role: the character being the general appearance, while the role concerns, in short, this ambiguous, tearing relationship that exists between the character and destiny. These are not quite the same thing.
For instance, as I pointed out, there may indeed be some mystery within this myth of Amphitryon.

It has long been noticed that, among all the adventures that the great god, father of men and gods, so liberally engaged in, this one had a remarkable characteristic: the woman was innocent. Even in Plautus, this theme of innocence is absolutely central. And I would say that the fact that Jupiter vouched, at one point, in all the forms this play has taken, for Alcmena’s innocence is by no means insignificant.

Good day! You have undoubtedly come to hear my lecture “Psychoanalysis and Cybernetics”? You will hear something quite different. Today, it will be about the ego. We approach the question of the ego this year from a certain angle, that is, from a different end than the one we took last year. Last year, we addressed it through the phenomenon of transference. This year, we are trying to understand it in relation to what we call the symbolic order—that is, the fact that man lives amidst a symbolic world, which here, in our discussion, means a world of language in which occurs this particular phenomenon called speech.

We are very interested in this. We consider that analysis takes place precisely within this milieu, and if one does not properly situate this milieu in relation to others that also exist—the real milieu, the milieu of imaginary mirages—one tends to let analysis drift either toward interventions (which, after all, is a trap into which we rarely fall) concerning the real, or, on the contrary, by placing an undue emphasis on the imaginary.

This has gradually led us, today, to speak of Molière’s play, Amphitryon. You will immediately see why. The myth of Amphitryon, from which we are departing, is a very particular myth, one to which I alluded last time with our visitor, the equally innocent Moreno.

I had alluded to it: I had pointed out that there was something that it might at least evoke for us. Surely—”our wife,” I said in a terse formula—it is certain that our wife must deceive us from time to time with God. It’s one of those succinct formulas one might use in the course of a joust, a verbal duel, but it still deserves to be commented on, even if only a little.

Already, you must surely glimpse, through everything I have said about the father—whose function can only be so decisive, so prevalent in the entire analytic theory, if it exists at several levels. We have already seen, quite manifest in “The Wolf Man,” this distinction:

• The symbolic father, which I call the Name-of-the-Father,
• The imaginary father, insofar as he is the rival,
• The real father, insofar as he, poor man, is endowed, like everyone else, with all sorts of layers.

Well, this deserves to be revisited, perhaps even more so on the level of the couple, namely: what is a husband?

In truth, fine minds, firm minds—they occasionally appear throughout history—have already been somewhat moved, alerted, by what we shall call the relationship between marriage and love. Generally speaking, these matters are treated in a playful, piquant, or cynical manner. Perhaps this is, after all, the best way to address them for practical use in life. There is a whole good old French tradition on this subject.

But we have seen thinkers, and very serious ones at that—we have seen Mr. Proudhon one day pause over these words marriage and love, and certainly not take them lightly. When one reads him…
I strongly recommend reading Proudhon; he was a firm mind, and in him, at certain turns, one can find that same sure tone as in the “Fathers of the Church.”
…to put it simply, he was someone who had reflected, with a little hindsight, on the human condition, trying to approach what might nonetheless underpin this thing, at once so much more tenacious and more fragile than one might think: fidelity.

He arrived at: “What could possibly motivate fidelity apart from the given word?” But the given word is often given lightly, and it is probable that if it were not given so, it would be given much more rarely, which would significantly hinder the course of good and worthy things in human society.

But as we have also noticed, this does not mean that it is not given, nor that it does not bear all its fruits. When it is broken, not only is everyone alarmed, worried, indignant, but also every rupture of the word carries consequences, whether we like it or not. And this is one of the things analysis teaches us precisely, through exploring this unconscious where speech continues to propagate its waves and its destinies, according to how the subject behaves.

To justify this fidelity, so imprudently pledged—and all natural observation shows not only that it is imprudently pledged, but that, strictly speaking, as all serious minds have never doubted, it is untenable.

Proudhon asked himself some questions. Let us try to overcome what we shall call the romantic illusion: namely, that it is this ideal value that partners represent for one another—the myth of perfect love—that justifies and supports all the promises lying at the foundation of human commitment.

In truth, Proudhon, whose entire thought goes against these romantic illusions, tries to establish—in a manner of expression that might at first seem obscure, even mystical—tries to give status, a foundation, to this order of fidelity in marriage, and he finds the solution, the culmination, in something which, no matter how one takes it, can only be recognized as a symbolic pact: a pact that binds one subject to another in a relationship.

For example, let us place ourselves in the perspective of the woman: the love a woman gives to her husband is a love that aims not at the individual…
even if she idealizes him, even if she can, over time, maintain an idealization—of which we know that this is undoubtedly the danger of what is called common life, for idealization too is untenable—
…but in truth, what the woman aims for in the marital pact, in this spouse to whom she has pledged her word, is a being beyond this being. I am not saying a particular being, but an individual one. And that love, in its truly sacred sense—the one that constitutes the bond of marriage—extends from “the woman” to what Proudhon calls “All Men.”

In the same way, through the woman, it is all women—thus expresses Proudhon—that the fidelity of the husband aims for.
This may certainly seem paradoxical. But it is clear that this “all…” in Proudhon is neither alle in German nor anything that in any way represents a quantity. It is undeniably a universal function. It is universal man, man as a symbol, the incarnation of the essential human couple’s partner, if one may put it this way, that is targeted in this theory.

Certainly, the fact that the bond, the pact of the word, goes beyond the individual relationship and its imaginary vicissitudes is something that does not require much experience to understand. But to grasp the conflict, so to speak, that arises between the symbolic pact and the imaginary relationships—which are abundantly stirred up, spontaneously proliferating within any properly libidinal relationship, and all the more so when what properly belongs to the order of passion and the order of Verliebtheit comes into play—it must be said that this conflict underpins, one might say, the vast majority of contemporary conflicts amidst which unfolds the vicissitude of destiny—it must indeed be called somehow—bourgeois, since it is built and continues:

• In the perspective of self-realization,
• In the alienation proper to the ego,
• Through the introduction of the ego as such into psychology.

One must pause for a moment to understand what this conflict signifies, what makes it particularly acute in a humanist perspective centered on the ego. One only needs to observe phenomena themselves to notice this. But on the other hand, to fully understand the reason behind it, I believe one must go a little further.

And it is not without reason that we will seek reference in the anthropological data that have been particularly highlighted by the work of Lévi-Strauss. He shows us something peculiar in the structure of alliance, on which his entire work places strong emphasis: that in this alliance, the woman is an object.
Radically, at the very foundation, at the starting point of the alliance as such, everything the analysis of elementary structures, expressed through kinship, induces us to think confirms this. It is a fact of analysis, an analysis of facts.

When we examine elementary structures…
you know that these elementary structures are naturally the most complicated,
and inversely, those we will call “complex” will present themselves as, in appearance, the simplest…
…among which we live, and in which we believe ourselves free in our choice of partner, that is: in our marital choice, where anyone can marry anyone.

This is a deep illusion, amidst which we live, because nothing in this regard is inscribed in the laws. In fact, quite the opposite is inscribed. This does not mean, however, that in practice, the underlying influence of something much subtler does not guide this choice, introducing preferential elements which, though veiled and concealed, are nonetheless essential.

The interest of so-called “elementary structures” is that they reveal to us, in all their complexity, the structure of these preferential elements. If one carefully studies “The Elementary Structures of Kinship” by Lévi-Strauss—I know that many of you are still more inclined towards resolutions than towards a thorough analysis of this crucial work—one notices why and how this is the only truly valid demonstration of the fact that women, in the introduction of the alliance…
so essential, since it defines the cultural order as such, in opposition to the natural order…
…in the introduction of the alliance into human nature, the woman manifests herself as an object, as an object of exchange, and precisely in the same sense, if one may say, as speech—insofar as speech is also originally the object of fundamental exchange in society.

And regardless of the goods, qualities, and statuses transmitted through matrilineal descent, and regardless of the authorities that may also be vested in what is referred to for this reason as matriarchal order, the symbolic order, in its original, fundamental, and initial operation, is androcentric. This is a fact. This is a fact that, of course, has not failed throughout history to receive all sorts of correctives. But neglecting its fundamental nature prevents us from understanding all sorts of things, particularly the completely asymmetrical position in romantic bonds and, especially, in its most eminent socialized form: the marital bond, the asymmetrical position of the woman.

If these things were viewed at their proper level and with some rigor, many phantoms that arise on other planes—failing to be understood where they must be—would be simultaneously dispelled. It is certain that in this perspective—I mean the marital pact—in its full form, in its accomplished form, and do not think I am speaking vaguely here, there are references in history that are extremely important.

The modern notion we have of marriage as a pact of mutual consent is undoubtedly a novelty introduced by the perspective of a religion of salvation, giving prevalence to the individual soul. In reality, it conceals and masks the initial structure given by the primordially sacred nature of marriage. It is utterly impossible to understand the history of this institution—which today reveals itself in its condensed form, where some of its traits are so solid and tenacious—without recognizing that social revolutions are far from erasing its prevalence and significance.

One must clearly see that, throughout history, there have always been two contracts of a very different nature. Among the Romans, for example, the marriage of those who have a name, who are truly patricians, nobles—innobiles literally meaning those without a name—patrician marriage precisely possesses this highly symbolic character, secured by ceremonies of a special nature.

I do not wish to delve into details, nor describe the confarreatio, which highlights the difference between essential marriage in the full sense and those marriages of the plebeians, which are essentially grounded on nothing in this perspective and constitute what Roman society technically calls “concubinage.”

It is worth noting that concubinage institutions, based on mutual consent, are exactly those that—amidst social fluidity—became widespread, and we even see concubinage established in the upper echelons during the final stages of Roman history.

To what end?

In order to maintain the independence of social statuses, and more specifically, the statuses regarding the property of the partners. In other words, it is from the moment when the woman emancipates herself, when the woman as such has the right to possess, when the woman becomes an individual in society, that the functions of marriage and their meaning are eroded and the two originally so different functions of marriage—depending on the social level of those to whom this institution applies—begin to merge and converge.

All this serves to establish, in a way, the framework of the setting in which today’s question arises: that fundamentally, the woman, in the symbolic pact of marriage, is introduced as an object of exchange between…
I will not say men, although it is men who effectively act as the supports of this exchange…
…but between lineages, and between fundamentally androcentric lineages, precisely because the perspective that allows us to understand the various elementary structures—namely, how this object of exchange, which women represent, circulates through lineages—always reveals itself, in practice, to hinge on an androcentric perspective. This remains true even when the structure is secondarily viewed from matrilineal or matriarchal ascendances. Its primitive, primordial character fundamentally retains a patriarchal perspective.

Well, the woman, as such, can only feel herself in this symbolic order as being engaged herself, in a sense, as an object within something that transcends her, in an order of exchange where she is an object. And this is precisely what makes her position fundamentally conflictual, I would even say without resolution, since this symbolic order literally subjugates her, transcends her.

And it is in light of this that we can understand the significance of Proudhonian commentary. That is to say, this “all men” in question refers to the universal man, who is at once the most concrete and the most transcendent man.
This means nothing other than this impasse, imposed by her specific function in the symbolic order, the impasse into which the woman is, in a sense, pushed.

For her, there is something insurmountable, let us say unacceptable, in the fact that she is placed in the position of an object within this symbolic order. And it is precisely because this symbolic order…
…to which she is, on the other hand, by her entire humanity, fully integrated and fully subjected, just as the man is…
…it is precisely because there is something:

• That is inaccessible to her and that dominates her,
• That places her in a secondary relationship to this symbolic order,

…that this incarnation of the god in man, or man in the god, necessarily occurs—unless, of course, there is conflict, for conflict always intervenes—and it is this transcendence to which she finds herself subjected, or to which she must find herself subjected, for her position to be anything other than conflictual.

In other words, if it is not, let us say, to a god or to the order of a god that the woman, in this fundamentally primitive form of marriage, is given and gives herself, then it cannot be—of course, this is what happens, for we have long since ceased to be capable of embodying gods—that she is subjected to all the imaginary degradations of this fundamental relationship.

[1] Namely, in the forefront during still harsh periods, what we call “a master.” This was the great period of women’s demands:

• A woman is not an object of possession!
• How is it that adultery is punished so asymmetrically?
• Are we slaves?

[2] With some progress, we arrived at the stage of the rival. This is, of course, a fundamental imaginary relationship, and we must not believe that our society, through the emancipation of so-called women, has any privilege over it.
This most direct rivalry between men and women is eternal. It has established itself in its fundamental style within marital relationships, placing at the forefront what is called the theme of sexual struggle. Only a few German psychoanalysts could imagine that this is a characteristic of our time.
When you have read Livy and you know the uproar caused in Rome by a formidable poisoning trial, you will see that in all patrician families it was common for women to poison their husbands, and they were dropping like flies because it had been going on for years. Women’s revolt is not something new.

[3] Then there is a third stage. From the master to the slave and to the rival, there is only one dialectical step. It’s essentially the same thing. The master-slave relationships are fundamentally reversible. Someone who is in the position of master can very quickly find themselves in dependence on their slave.
Nowadays, we have reached a new nuance, thanks to the introduction of psychoanalytic notions. The husband has become the child. For some time now, women have been taught to treat him well. In this way, the circle is complete. We return to the state of nature.
This is the conception that some have of the proper intervention of psychoanalysis in what are called human relations, propagated through all kinds of mediating masks, teaching men and women how to behave so that there may be peace at home.

The real solution here is that the woman plays the role of mother, and the man plays the role of child. We will find there essentially harmonious relationships. It is a solution to this conflictual element. But perhaps we are here to suggest that this is not necessarily why analysis has provided its inspiration to the propaganda of human relations.

That being said, we should not be surprised that the ancient myth, so rich, so polyvalent, so enigmatic—one can offer a thousand interpretations of the myth of Amphitryon—recognized that, in order for the situation to be tenable, the position must always be triangular, even within the couple. And for it to hold on a human level, there must indeed be a god present.

This, I believe, is the profound meaning of the myth of Amphitryon. And it may give us some pause for thought. But I assure you that it is still to this universal man, this veiled man, whose every ideal is but an idolatrous substitute, that love may be directed—that famous “genital love” about which we boast so much, yet which leads every author into a dead end.

I invite you to reread what Mr. Balint wrote on this subject to realize that, insofar as these authors are rigorous and experimental, they strictly reach the conclusion that this famous “genital love” is absolutely nothing at all.

For Mr. Balint, whom I take as an example—he is not the only one to have shown this discernment—this latest news of genital love, seen through the lens of rigorous psychoanalytic experience, absolutely resists being assimilated into a unity. It concludes:

• First, the genital act, which, as everyone knows, does not last long—it’s good, but it doesn’t last, and it establishes absolutely nothing.
• Second, on the other side, tenderness, whose origins are recognized as pre-genital.

This is the conclusion reached by the most honest minds within the dual perspective of instinctual maturation, remaining confined within a dual relationship to establish the norm of human relationships.

Well, that is the entire interpretation. I believe it was necessary to insist on it a little, to remind you of some fundamental truths:

• Even for those who are familiar with them, it is never useless.
• For those who are here for the first time, it might surprise them in their naïve faith in the wonders of psychoanalysis, but it is not a bad thing for them to learn that we possess a certain discernment regarding the harmonious fruits one might expect from a situation that is not harmonious in itself, but fundamentally conflictual.

This is human destiny, and it is only from this point that we can move forward into something other than myths.
Well, after having reminded you of this framework, this fundamental question posed by the myth of Amphitryon, we will now see what it is about in Plautus and in Molière.

I can tell you—it’s a fact, that’s how it is—just as with the establishment of androcentrism in the symbolic order, it’s a fact that it was Plautus who introduced Sosia. There was no Sosia in the myth of Amphitryon. Greek myths are not egoic, but egos do exist, and there is one place where egos quite naturally have a voice: comedy.

This is why it is essential that it was a comic poet—which does not mean a funny poet; I believe some of you have already reflected on this point—who introduced this essential novelty, now inseparable from the myth of Amphitryon: Sosia. Sosia is the ego.

It’s about understanding how man behaves on this grand stage where he participates, I must say singularly, in the banquet of the gods—a participation that always somewhat excludes him from his own enjoyment. How does such an ego, a brave little ego of an ordinary man, like you and me, behave in everyday life? And if this irresistibly comic side is, after all, what has continually nourished theater ever since—ultimately, it’s always about me, you, and the other. Well, how does the ego in question behave?

It is truly exemplary that the first time the ego emerges at the level of this essential drama, it encounters itself at the door, precisely in the form of what has, for eternity (ad aeternum), become Sosia, the other self.

I will read you a few excerpts. One must have this in one’s ear.

The first time the ego appears, it encounters the ego.
And who, me? Me, who’s throwing you out! And that’s what it’s all about. This is where the comedy of Amphitryon is truly exemplary. It is enough to pick here and there to realize how even the forms of style and language demonstrate that those who introduced this fundamental character knew exactly what they were dealing with.

This play by Plautus, for example, where for the first time this essential character, Sosia, comes onto the stage, unfolds as a dialogue in the night. You will appreciate—I refer you to it; I will not read the entire Latin text—the absolutely striking character of it, and this is truly the case, using a term that must be put in quotes, the “symbolic” character.

These characters perform according to a tradition—so often poorly supported in modern acting—of the aside, where two characters are together on stage and exchange words, each line gaining its value from the echo or misunderstanding—which are essentially the same thing—created in the independent words of the other. This is something that, due to insufficient acting, may now seem artificial. But it is by no means accidental that it is essential to classical comedy. Here, it is brought to its supreme degree.

And I couldn’t help but think of this the other day while attending Chinese theater, where this is taken to its supreme degree, manifested in gestures. These actors speak Chinese, and yet you are captivated by everything they demonstrate. It is indeed a grand tradition of this theater—so spectacular as to be acrobatic—to see how, for more than a quarter of an hour (it feels like hours), two characters can move around the same stage, giving us the true impression of being in two entirely different spaces: each in total darkness. And with what skill, resources, and ingenious multiplicities they can literally pass through each other.

For this is what is demonstrated to us: that the imaginary space is there, in front of us. These beings reach each other at every moment through a gesture that cannot fail to strike the opponent, and yet it avoids him because it turns out he is already elsewhere. This truly sensational demonstration suggests both the mirage-like character of space, imaginary as such, and the fact that this is precisely the characteristic of the symbolic plane: there is never an encounter that is a collision.

This is indeed what always happens, and especially the first time Sosia appears on the classical stage. Sosia arrives and meets Sosia. The dialogue that is established between them deserves to be taken:

– Who goes there?
– Me.
– Who, me?
– Me.
– Courage, Sosia!

he says to himself, for this one, of course, is the real one, and he is not at ease.

– What is your fate?
– To be a man and to speak.

Here is someone who had never attended seminars, but who bears the trademark.

– Are you master or servant?
– As I feel inclined.

This is taken directly from Plautus, and it’s a very fine definition of the ego:
“Are you master or servant?” – “As I feel inclined.”

– Where are your steps directed?
– Where I intend to go.

And then it continues:

– Ah! This displeases me.
– My soul is overjoyed.

…says the fool, who naturally expects to receive a beating and is already swaggering.

This essential dialogue must be rediscovered at the various stages of the comedy. It is never disappointing, and this is what we will now try to highlight. It is the same in Latin as what Molière modeled in French: the fundamental position of the ego in the face of its image and its reflection, and the immediate reversibility of the master-servant position.

I would like to point out that it is in this text that we can find confirmation of the strict significance of the term I have given—at least to some of you—to the word “fides”, as being equivalent to the term “given word”:
Tuae fidei credo, I believe in your word.

This is precisely what happens at the moment when Mercury begins to lessen his blows, and an explanation is required. Mercury makes a promise, whatever the other may say, not to strike him again. At that moment, Sosia says: “I believe in your word.” Fides, in Latin, means nothing other than the given word. This has a retrospective value in relation to our discussion here.

The innobilis from earlier, the man without a name, is also a term you will find in the Latin text.

In essence, what is this about? You know how much this is one of the most hilarious themes of Sosia’s entrance. In Molière’s play, it takes center stage; I would even say that it is all about him. He opens the scene immediately after the dialogue between Mercury, which sets up the night of Jupiter.

Sosia arrives with a lantern. Let us try to see the psychological significance of this drama and follow a tradition—the very practice we tend to criticize—of viewing the elements of the drama as the incarnation of internal characters.

Sosia arrives, brave little Sosia, bearing the victory of his master. He comes to make himself heard by Alcmene, as in the hilarious scene I mentioned, where he prepares to recount it. He puts down the lantern and says: “Here is Alcmene.” And he begins to tell her of his master’s prowess. In short:

• He is the man who imagines that the object of his desire, the peace of his enjoyment, depends on his merits.
• He is the man of the superego.
• He is the man who eternally wants to rise to the dignity of the ideals of the father, the master, or whatever you wish, believing that through this, he will reach what he seeks: namely, the object of his desire.

If there is anything that characterizes this play, it is that Sosia will never succeed in making himself heard by Alcmene. And the reason he will never succeed in making himself heard by Alcmene is written into the text: it is because the very nature of the ego, its fundamental relationship to the world, is always to encounter its reflection. And its reflection, as such, deprives it of everything it might dream of achieving itself. As an ego, it encounters this kind of shadow, reflection, image, which is at once that of a rival, a master, a slave occasionally if one wishes—but certainly something that fundamentally separates it from what is at stake: namely, the recognition of desire as such.

At this point, the intervention of what? Of the real master, the one who represents for Sosia his guarantor, his merits, the reason why he belongs to the household. The Latin text contains extremely striking formulas in this regard. Throughout this priceless dialogue, Mercury, through relentless blows, forces Sosia to abandon his own identity, to renounce his own name, just as Galileo would later say, “And yet it moves!” And yet he continually returns to:

“Still, I am Sosia.”

And he utters this marvelous line:

“By Pollux, tu me alienabis non quant, you will never make me other than what I am, who belongs to us.”

You can see it: alienation is there, right in the Latin text, and the intervention of noster: “For indeed, I am here because I am ours.”

The support of the ego, or the last support of the ego at the level of Plautus, is barely found—though indicated—in Molière. It is because it is tied to this entire order, to this belonging, to the fact that his master is a great general. And we can see just how much the ego is sheltered by the ‘we’.

When Amphitryon, the master, arrives, what do we see? The one who is supposed to restore order, the one who is supposed to make himself heard? The remarkable thing about this play is precisely that Amphitryon will be just as confused, just as deceived, just as lost as Sosia himself.

But in any case, one thing he absolutely does not understand is everything that Sosia tells him—namely, that he has encountered another self.

In the Latin text, this is incredibly striking. In Molière’s text, the emphasis is worth rediscovering:

AMPHITRYON: “What patience must I exhort myself to! But in the end, did you not enter the house?”
SOSIA: “Yes, entered. Ah! But how?” […]
AMPHITRYON: “How so?”
SOSIA: “With a stick across my back…”
AMPHITRYON: “And who?”
SOSIA: “Me.”
AMPHITRYON: “You? Beaten?”
SOSIA: “Yes, me. Not the me from here, but the me from the house, who strikes like four…”
“I have received the evidence of it, and that devil of a Me beat me properly…”
“Me, I tell you… This Me who gave me a thrashing.”

It is precisely when Amphitryon intervenes—whose scenic value you will soon see—that Amphitryon does nothing but add to the blows that the unfortunate Sosia receives.

In other words, Amphitryon is analyzing his negative transference. He teaches Sosia what an ego must be. He nourishes him, too, nourishes him with blows. He explains to him how he must reintegrate into his ego the properties of the ego.

The scenes are witty and inimitable. I could multiply the examples showing this contradiction that arises in the subject between—always the same—the symbolic plane and the real plane.

It is indeed the case that Sosia has come to doubt being himself. And when did he come to doubt it? When Mercury reveals to him something very special: what he did at a time when no one was watching him.

Astonished by what Mercury reveals about his own behavior, Sosia says:

“And what, am I beginning to doubt in earnest?”

He has already begun to yield a little. In the Latin text, this is also remarkable:

“How I recognize my own image, which I have often seen in the mirror, in speculum.”

He says this, and he makes an entire enumeration of symbolic and historical characteristics, just as in Molière, of course.

But still, the contradiction breaks out. It also exists on the imaginary plane, that is:

“Equidem certo idem qui semper fuit, I am still the same as I have always been.”

And here comes the appeal to familiar imaginary elements:

“I have already seen this house; it is indeed the same…”

This entire appeal shifts the plane of analysis into the realm of intuitive certainty—tied to something whose deceptive nature also carries the character of déjà vu, of already felt, already recognized experiences. These are experiences so prone to discord that many conflicts arise from this déjà vu, already recognized, already felt, and the certainties derived from remembrance and history.

This is where phenomena of depersonalization begin to emerge, where some will inevitably see premonitory signs of disintegration.

Yet, it is not at all necessary to be predisposed to psychosis to have experienced such feelings countless times. It is precisely in the relationship between the symbolic and the imaginary that the mechanism and significance reside.

Well, here we are at the level of the encounter between Amphitryon and Sosia, at the moment when Sosia expresses his disarray, his dispossession, and at the moment when Amphitryon conducts, I would say, a supportive psychotherapy.

We will, of course, refrain from placing Amphitryon in the position of the psychoanalyst; we will simply say that he can still serve as a symbol for it, insofar as the psychoanalyst, in a certain posture—the one from the schema I presented to you last time—does indeed, in relation to his object (if the object of his love, his distant princess, is indeed psychoanalysis), occupy the fundamentally exiled position (let’s put it politely) that Amphitryon finds himself in before his own door.

What is serious is not this kind of spiritual cuckolding of which he is the victim; it is that the victim is, moreover, his patient. That is to say, everyone—and God knows I have had many testimonies about this—believes they have reached the deepest depths of the analytical experience simply because, during their analysis, they have had a few fantasies or a Verliebtheit, an infatuation, for the person who, in their analyst, opens the door to them. This is not an uncommon testimony, although here I am alluding to a few very particular cases.

The subject, in their encounter with the so-called analytical experience, will be fundamentally dispossessed and deceived. In other words, to use the schema I left suspended last time, the issue is that the subject, in relation to the wall of language, in relation to this ego, sees this ego beyond himself, among all the other objects. The question is: what conception does the analyst have of their role?

The conception the analyst has of their role is essentially this: that speech—insofar as in common dialogue, in the established world of language, in the world of commonly accepted misunderstanding—speech flows from a subject who does not know what they are saying. For at every moment, the mere fact that we speak proves that we do not know. This is, in fact, the very foundation of analysis: that we say a thousand times more than is necessary to justify execution.

What we say, we do not know, but we address it to someone. And it is insofar as we address it to someone—someone who is imaginary, endowed with an ego—and to this ego as such, we have the illusion, because of the straight-line propagation of speech I mentioned last time, that this speech comes from somewhere, located precisely where we situate, in a privileged way, our own ego, which is justifiably separated, on this schema, from all other egos.

For, as Giraudoux points out somewhere in his Amphitryon, when Jupiter tries to understand from Mercury approximately what humans are, he tells him, among other things:

“Man is this character who constantly wonders whether he exists.”

And he is absolutely right; his only fault is in answering “yes” to himself. At least, he is quite sure of that. And indeed, the privileged position of the ego in relation to all others, the only one of which man can be truly certain when he questions himself—and God knows how much he questions himself—is fundamentally there, all alone.

And it is because it is at this level, at the level of the other’s ego, that speech is received, that the subject maintains the sweet illusion that this ego exists in this unique position. As I indicated and explained to you: everything lies there. That is to say, whether the analyst believes they must respond from there, whether they must endorse this function of the ego—which is precisely that by which the subject is dispossessed of themselves—whether they should simply tell them: return to your ego, or rather, reintegrate into it everything you let escape, reassemble yourself, and, following the introjective theory, reconstitute yourself in the fullness of those pulsions and instincts that you misrecognize and ignore.

In other words, through a whole series of interventions, whatever they may be—interventions of a dual type, the introduction of the categories of the world, of the object-relational perspective of the analyst into the reconstitution of the subject—or whether, on the contrary, the issue is that the subject learns what speaks from there.

And to know what speaks from there, they must perceive the paradox, the fundamentally imaginary nature of what happens, of what is spoken from there, when is evoked, as such, the Absolute Other: A, who is always there, the transcendent within language every time a word attempts to be uttered.

There is a very concrete case, which is that of the obsessive. What exists in the obsessive is the maximum incidence of the ego insofar as it is mortal. What lies behind the obsessive is not, as certain theorists claim, the danger of madness, that is, the unleashed symbol, the schizoid subject, the subject who speaks, so to speak, at the level of their pulsions, the fundamental alienation of the ego. It is not that at all.

It is the ego insofar as it carries within itself this dispossession. It is imaginary death.

If the obsessive mortifies himself, it is because, as someone more attached to their ego than any other neurotic, they are, precisely to that extent, more alienated from themselves than anyone else. And why? That is the crucial question, though the fact itself is perfectly obvious.

The obsessive, in everything they tell you, is always someone else. Whatever feelings they bring to you, they are always those of another self. This objectification of themselves is not, as is often said, due to a greater introspective or analytical inclination. It is precisely because they avoid their own desire, where every desire—even one in which they appear to engage—is typically presented as the desire of that other self, which is their ego.

Is it not, then, to reinforce this tendency when we think of strengthening their ego, of enabling them to recognize their various pulsions: oral, anal, late oral stage, primary anal stage? Is it not simply to lead them to recognize what they want—which we know from the start is the destruction of the Other? And how could it not be the destruction of the Other, since that is precisely what it’s about—since it is about the destruction of themselves, which is exactly the same thing?

Above all, before enabling them to recognize this fundamental aggressiveness, which they disperse upon the world, which they refract upon it, and which literally structures all their object relations, we must first and foremost make them understand why this is so.

Namely, what is the function of this mortal relationship they have with themselves, which means that from the outset, as soon as something arises as a feeling of their own, they will begin by nullifying it, by declaring they do not care about it, that it does not matter much to them.

You can precisely note, through an inverse relationship, the validity and the accent of doubt: if the obsessive tells you that he does not care about something or someone, you can assume that it is something close to his heart. Conversely, if he expresses himself with the greatest coldness, that is precisely where his deepest interests are engaged.

What does this mean? The first thing we must do with the obsessive is:

• It is not to make him recognize himself in this decomposed image that he presents of himself, in the more or less bloated, degraded, loosened form of his aggressive impulses.
• It is not in this dual relationship with himself that the key to the cure lies.

Of course, this is essential! But if this interpretation of his mortal relationship with himself is to have any impact, it is to the extent that you make him understand its function. It is not to himself, nor is he really dead.

For whom is he dead? For his master. We have just explained and stated this. But, in relation to what? In relation to the object of his enjoyment.

But on the other hand, if he is dead, or if he presents himself as such, then he is no longer there, meaning it is another self who has a master, and he himself, inversely, has another master.

This is why he is always elsewhere and, as a desiring subject, he infinitely duplicates himself into a series of characters whose discovery Fairbairn and others from this lineage marvelously describe. They reveal that there are far more than the three characters Freud speaks of in the subject’s psychology: id, superego, and ego.

There are always at least two others who appear in the corners. You will find this in Fairbairn, whose work I recommend you read.

But certainly, even more can be found. Like in a mirror with tain—if you look carefully, there is not just one image, but a second one that duplicates itself. And if the silver backing is thick enough, you will notice that there are ten, twenty, an infinity of reflections.

It is exactly the same thing that happens insofar as the subject annuls himself, mortifies himself before his master. He becomes yet another, since he is always there—another with another master and another slave, and so on.

In the same way, for the object of his desire, in order to consent to it, he introduces into himself the essential danger of his relationship with the Other. The object of his desire, as I have discussed in the commentary on The Rat Man and as I have also linked to Goethe’s novel, involves the automatic duplication of the object of desire and the object of love in the obsessive’s relationships. This is something absolutely fundamental.

It is necessary that what he cares about is always other, because if he were to truly recognize it as such, he would be cured.

In other words, contrary to what certain analytical theories tell us, what the subject must aim for—the essential progress of analysis—is not achieved through maintaining some form of self-observation, allegedly founded on the famous splitting of the ego’s duplication, which is said to be fundamental in the analytic situation.

This only perpetuates the fundamentally ambiguous relationship of the ego.

What he must learn in analysis is certainly not through observation, which will always remain an observation of observation, and so on. Progress must happen when he learns that in this speech that always misses its target—let’s call it S’—insofar as, in analysis, he must realize that it takes place somewhere beyond but no longer encounters anything, except the Absolute Other, whom he does not know how to recognize.

It is gradually that he must reintegrate into himself this speech, that is, finally speak to the Absolute Other from where he is, from where his ego must realize itself.

By reintegrating into himself the paranoid decomposition of his impulses—among which it is not enough to say that he does not recognize himself—it must be said that fundamentally, as an ego, he misrecognizes them.

In other words, what Sosia must learn is not that he never met his Sosia. It is entirely true that he did meet him. He must learn that he is Amphitryon.

And it is precisely because he is Amphitryon—that is, the man full of glory, a man who understands nothing about anything, who believes that being a victorious general is enough to make love to his wife—even though everyone knows that this has never been enough for anyone, far from it!

• He must realize that this is what he is, realize that it is because he is Amphitryon, because he does not understand anything about what is desired, because he is fundamentally alienated, that he never encounters the object of his desires.
• He must realize why he fundamentally clings to this ego, and how this ego is, in itself, his fundamental alienation.
• He must perceive this profound twinship, which is also one of the essential perspectives of Amphitryon, and this happens on two planes: on the plane of his doubles, of his mirages, which mirror each other, and also, on the upper plane, at the level of the gods, through the simultaneous birth from the womb of Alcmene, which is much more present—we have since acquired a modesty that prevents us from delving deeply into these matters—in Plautus’ play. Alcmene gives birth, through a double love, to a double fruit.

Finally, I believe that through this myth, this dramatic demonstration, if not psychodramatic, represented for us by Amphitryon, I simply wanted to help you feel today how it inscribes itself within a traditional framework of thought, addressing the very problems that we encounter in analysis. These problems always offer two aspects to our practice:

• On one side, a fundamentally psychological illusion, which exists, and I advise you to seek examples of it in the very writings of the authors who support it.

In Fairbairn, whom I mentioned the other day, you have a very striking example. It is not about an obsessive subject; the case is not that complicated. It concerns a woman with an actual genital anomaly—probably, though with peculiar timidity, the matter was never entirely clarified.

She has a very small vagina, which was respected: she is a virgin. And probably, corresponding to this tiny vagina, there is no uterus.

The anomaly remains almost certain without being fully confirmed. But undeniably, the anomaly, at least on the level of secondary sexual characteristics, is evident.

Some specialists have even gone so far as to call it pseudo-hermaphroditism, suggesting that this person is, in reality, a man.

This is the subject that Fairbairn takes into analysis.

And I must say that the kind of grandeur with which the entire continuation of this case is developed is something truly worth noting. He observes—and recounts to us with perfect composure—that this subject, who is after all a personality of evident interest and quality, happens to be a schoolteacher. Over the course of her life, she learned that there was clearly something not quite right, that her situation was indeed quite peculiar compared to the reality of the sexes.

She learned it all the more because, I believe, there were about ten children in her family. Among them, there were six or seven girls with the same condition, so they knew about it; they were aware that women can be oddly bicornuate. This was not due to obscurantism playing its role.

She told herself, “Obviously, this is something special,” and she rejoiced in it. She said to herself: “This way, there will be many troubles that won’t be mine.” So she bravely became a schoolteacher and set about wisely instructing children.

But gradually, she began to realize that, far from being freed from burdens, and far from nature granting her complete fulfillment for a purely spiritual activity, strange things started happening. Things were never right. It was never good enough. She felt horribly tyrannized by her scruples. She wanted to do better.

And when she had exhausted herself, when she had completely worn herself out by the second trimester, she had a depressive crisis. It went very far.

What did the analyst teach her? He thought one thing. Above all, he thought about reintegrating her impulses, that is, making her aware of something—a phallic complex. And “Bingo!” Yes, it’s true!

They discovered there was a connection:

• Between the fact that she was affected, as the English say, by certain men, that the proximity of certain men stirred something in her,
• And the onset of depressive crises.

The analyst deduced, discovered, that she wanted to harm them. And for months, he taught her to reintegrate this aggressive impulse.

And all this time, he said to himself: “Good Lord! What a little trooper! She’s taking this so well!”

What he was waiting for was for her to develop what he called feelings of guilt.

Well, believe it or not, he succeeded! In the end, the progress of the analysis culminated and was recorded at the time the observation was reported in the following terms:

“She has finally reached her feeling of guilt,” meaning that now it’s very simple: she can no longer approach a man without triggering crises of remorse, which this time, finally, have substance.

In other words, in accordance with the schema I presented to you the other day, which was from the author himself, it becomes clear that the analyst has given her:

• First, an ego, that is, he taught her what she really wanted: to destroy men.
• Second, he also gave her a superego, namely that all of this is very wicked, and furthermore, it is completely forbidden to approach these men.

This is what the author calls “the paranoid stage of analysis.”

I am quite willing to believe it. Having taught her where her impulses reside—well, my goodness—he succeeded quite well, meaning that now she sees them wandering everywhere.

• Is this truly the correct path, and could there not have been another one?
• In other words, should this issue really be situated within this real dual relationship concerning the subject’s depressive crises?
• Is the relationship between her and men a real relationship?
• Is it essentially, and as such, a libidinal relationship, with everything it entails within the schema of regression?

It seems the author has the answer right at hand. The subject’s real anomaly should have guided him, namely that the images of men, with their depressive effects on this subject, are tied to the fact that the men represent herself.

It is her own image. It is her own image, inasmuch as she is deprived of it, alienated from it, robbed of it, that exerts on her this disintegrating action, which is, strictly speaking, disconcerting. If you wish, in the full and original sense of the word, it is quite literally the foundation of the depressive position.

It is precisely because these few men she approaches are her own image, her narcissistic image, her ego, that this effect occurs. And what is truly at stake for her, the path she must find, lies precisely in this: to know who she truly is.

And the situation will undoubtedly be more difficult for her than for someone else, since she is in an ambiguous position. But if this ambiguous position is […] illustrated in teratology, it is something that should be clear to an analyst if they remembered that every form of narcissistic identification is, as such, ambiguous.

Far from this, instead of realizing that there is no better illustration of the function of penis envy in a subject than in this subject here—namely, that it is precisely because there is an identification with the imaginary man that the penis takes on its fully symbolic value, that there is both a question and a problem.

Far from this, there seems to be an argument suggesting that we would be entirely wrong to believe that penis envy is something entirely natural in women. Of course! Who ever said it was natural? Naturally, it is symbolic.

It is precisely because the woman is situated within a symbolic order with an androcentric perspective that the penis acquires this value, which, incidentally, is not the penis but the phallus—that is, something with a possible symbolic use.

It has a possible symbolic use simply because it is visible, because it is erect.

There is a symbolic usage that is not possible: it is what is not seen, what is hidden. In this woman’s case, it is perfectly obvious that the function of penis envy is fully active, because she does not know who she is, whether she is a man or a woman.

And penis envy is all the more active because she is, in a way, entirely engaged in this question of her symbolic significance. This is the knot of the problem.

And the entire perspective of observation shows quite clearly how this particular anomaly, tied to her position in relation to the real, is also, in a way, doubled by something else: in her family—and this may not be unrelated to this teratological appearance—the masculine side is completely erased, the patrilineal side is an entirely absent figure.

It was her mother’s father who played the role of superior figure. And it is in relation to him that the triangle is established in a typical way, and it is in relation to him that the question of her phallicization or non-phallicization is posed.

All of this is completely overlooked in the theory and in the conduct of treatment, under the premise that the primary objective is to make the subject recognize her impulses—and most specifically, of course, because in truth, they are the only ones encountered fully and as such—the impulses we elegantly call pre-genital.

Thanks to this thorough investigation of the pre-genital, we arrive at an outcome, or at least a phase, which the therapist qualifies as paranoid.

We should not be surprised: taking the imaginary for the real is what characterizes paranoia. And by misrecognizing, as such, the fundamental imaginary register, we will indeed lead the subject to recognize all these so-called partial impulses in the real.

That is, we will charge all her relationships with men—which until then were narcissistic (which was already not simple)—to become, strictly speaking, inter-aggressive. This complicates them significantly.

The fact that she passes, in the meantime, through a guilt that was painfully difficult to elicit does not leave us with much hope for the further detours necessary to return to a more peaceful path.

I have taken only this example to illustrate the theoretical lines that I am trying to demonstrate here through exemplary forms.

You do not have to look far to find the consequences of an error. This is a truly exemplary observation.

Regarding the treatment of obsessive neurosis, which is so central to our analytical concerns, this becomes even more glaring. It undeniably appears as one of the secret mechanisms behind the failures of most of these treatments.

If one starts with the idea that behind obsessive neurosis lies a latent psychosis, it is not surprising that one arrives at latent dissociations, at substituting them with periodic depressions, or even at an orientation toward a hypochondriac mental state, or at best, the establishment of an obsessive neurosis structure.

But perhaps this is not what one might best seek or achieve in the treatment of obsessive neurosis.

In short, however distant—or perhaps even lofty and panoramic—our remarks here may seem, you must always remember that they have precise implications in technique, not merely in the understanding of cases.