Freud's prehistoric matrix‐Owing ‘nature’ a death

Dados Bibliográficos

ID8971498
AutoresJoan Raphael‐Leff (11 South Hill Park Gardens, London, NW3 2TD, UK, autor correspondente)
Ano2007
Volume88
Fascículo6
Páginas1345-1373
Data de publicação2007-12-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe International Journal of Psychoanalysis (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0020-7578 • E-ISSN: 1745-8315
EditoraTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1516/c786-2226-2kj1-m134
PMID18055371
OpenAlexW1998970108
IdiomaEN
Referências citadas23

This paper is informed by contemporary literature in two fields--neonatal research, on the one hand, and the burgeoning interdisciplinary interest in Moses and monotheism, on the other. The author postulates that a cluster of traumatic events during the first two years of Freud's life compelled him to repeat what could not be remembered. Embedded in charged implicit schema, these affects remained unprocessed in Freud, who alone of all psychoanalysts did not have an analysis, manifesting in an uncanny dread/allure of the 'prehistoric' as a dark and dangerous era relating to the archaic feminine/maternal matrix and fratricidal murderousness. Furthermore, she cites evidence to suggest that for Freud this unconsciously excluded subtext of the preoedipal era became associated with ancient Egyptian and Minoan-Mycenaean cultures, a passionate fascination actualized in his collection of antiquities yet incongruously absent in his theoretical work, with three exceptions--Egyptian allusions in Leonardo's unconscious attachment to his archaic mother; the 'Minoan-Mycenaean' analogy on discovering the pre-oedipal mother shortly after the death of Freud's own mother; and Egypt as cradle of humanity in his uncharacteristically rambling, troubled text of Moses and monotheism. The author sees Freud's conceptual avoidance yet compulsive reworking of the prehistoric matrix as a symptomatic attempt to expose early unformulated representations that 'return to exert a powerful effect

Analogy · Archaeology · Art · Epistemology · Humanity · Legend · Literature · Monotheism · Prehistory · Psychoanalysis · Psychoanalytic theory · Subtext · Theology · Uncanny · Unconscious mind · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · History · Paranormal Experiences and Beliefs · Philosophy · Psychology · Psychotherapy Techniques and Applications