Rhetoric and Culture in Lacan (Literature, Culture, Theory, Series Number 19)

This is the first book to explore Lacan's theory of poetry and its relationship to his understanding of the subject and historicity. Gilbert Chaitin's lucid and accessible study of this famously complex thinker shows how Lacan moves beyond the traditionally hostile polarities of poetics and philosophy. For Lacan, the subject is a complex interplay among psychoanalysis, rationality and history, a combination that enabled him to illuminate literature's role in the creation of selfhood. The ambiguities, contradictions and singularities in Lacan are explored in this definitive account of the theoretical development across his entire career. "This is the first book to explore the full range and import of Lacan's theory of poetry and its relationship to his understanding of the subject and historicity. Gilbert Chaitin provides a lucid and accessible study of this famously complex thinker. He shows how Lacan moves beyond the traditionally hostile polarities of mythos and logos, poetics and philosophy, to conceive of the subject as a complex interplay between symbolic systems, desire and history. Lacan incorporates the function of historical contingency into the formation of subjectivity, a combination which in turn illuminates the role literature plays in the creation of selfhood. Lacan's metaphor of the subject, Chaitin argues, drew not only on Saussure, Jakobson, Freud, Heidegger and Hegel, but on hitherto unacknowledged influences such as Bertrand Russell and I. A. Richards. Chaitin explores the ambiguities, contradictions and singularities of Lacan's immensely influential work to provide a definitive account of Lacan's theoretical development across the entire career."--BOOK JACKET This is the first book to explore the full range and import of Lacan's theory of poetry and its relationship to his understanding of the subject and historicity. Gilbert Chaitin's lucid and accessible study of this famously complex thinker shows how Lacan moves beyond the traditionally hostile polarities of mythos and logos, poetics and philosophy, to conceive of the subject as a complex interplay between psychoanalysis, rationality and history. Lacan's incorporation of historical necessity into the formation of subjectivity enables him to illuminate the role literature plays in the creation of selfhood. Lacan's metaphor of the subject, Chaitin argues, draws not only on Saussure, Jakobson, Freud, Heidegger and Hegel but on hitherto unacknowledged sources such as Bertrand Russell and I.A. Richards. Chaitin explores the ambiguities, contradictions and singularities of Lacan's immensely influential work to provide a definitive account of the theoretical development across his entire career This is the first book to explore Lacan's theory of poetry and its relationship to subjectivity and history. Chaitin's lucid study explores Lacan's move beyond the polarities of poetics and philosophy to embrace literature's role in the creation of self hood. This book is a definitive study of Lacan's theoretical development across the entire career. Treeing Lacan, or the meaning of metaphor A being of significance From logic to ethics: transference and the letter Desire and culture: transference and the other The subject and the symbolic order: historicity, mathematics, poetry Conclusion: Lacan and contemporary criticism. Gilbert D. Chaitin. Includes Bibliographical References.