Irrepressible Truth: On Lacan’s ‘The Freudian Thing’ (The Palgrave Lacan Series)

This book offers readers a uniquely detailed engagement with the ideas of legendary French psychoanalyst Jacques Laca__n. The Freudian Thing__ is one of Lacan’s most important texts, wherein he explains the significance and stakes of his “return to Freud” as a passionate defence of Freud’s disturbing, epoch-making discovery of the unconscious, against misrepresentations and criticisms of it. However, Lacan is characteristically cryptic in __The Freudian Thing__. The combination of his writing style and vast range of references renders much of his thinking inaccessible to all but a narrow circle of scholarly specialists. Johnston’s Irrepressible Truth opens up the universe of Lacanian psychoanalysis to much wider audiences by furnishing a sentence-by-sentence interpretive unpacking of this pivotal 1955 essay. In so doing, Johnston reveals the precision, rigor, and soundness of Lacan’s teachings. This book offers readers a uniquely detailed engagement with the ideas of legendary French psychoanalyst Jacques Laca n. The Freudian Thing is one of Lacan’s most important texts, wherein he explains the significance and stakes of his “return to Freud” as a passionate defence of Freud’s disturbing, epoch-making discovery of the unconscious, against misrepresentations and criticisms of it. However, Lacan is characteristically cryptic in The Freudian Thing . The combination of his writing style and vast range of references renders much of his thinking inaccessible to all but a narrow circle of scholarly specialists. Johnston’s Irrepressible Truth opens up the universe of Lacanian psychoanalysis to much wider audiences by furnishing a sentence-by-sentence interpretive unpacking of this pivotal 1955 essay. In so doing, Johnston reveals the precision, rigor, and soundness of Lacan’s teachings. Front Matter ....Pages i-xxvi Situation in Time and Place of This Exercise (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 1-13 The Adversary (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 15-33 The Thing Speaks of Itself (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 35-51 Parade (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 53-65 The Thing’s Order (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 67-92 Resistance to the Resisters (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 93-107 Interlude (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 109-122 The Other’s Discourse (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 123-134 Imaginary Passion (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 135-150 Analytic Action (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 151-168 The Locus of Speech (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 169-194 Symbolic Debt (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 195-216 The Training of Analysts to Come (Adrian Johnston)....Pages 217-228 Back Matter ....Pages 229-257 Preface 7 Acknowledgements 14 Contents 16 Introduction 18 1 Situation in Time and Place of This Exercise 26 2 The Adversary 39 3 The Thing Speaks of Itself 58 4 Parade 75 5 The Thing’s Order 88 6 Resistance to the Resisters 114 7 Interlude 129 8 The Other’s Discourse 143 9 Imaginary Passion 155 10 Analytic Action 171 11 The Locus of Speech 189 12 Symbolic Debt 215 13 The Training of Analysts to Come 237 Conclusion Taking It to the Dogs: Actaeon’s Revenge 249 Bibliography 259 Index 270 Adrian Johnston. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.