Writings on Psychoanalysis [Paperback]

Louis Althusser (Author), Olivier Corpet (Editor), François Matheron (Editor), Jeffrey Mehlman (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 15, 1999 | ISBN-10: 0231101694 | ISBN-13: 978-0231101691

With several never-before published writings, this volume gathers Althusser's major essays on psychoanalytic thought----documenting his intense and ambivalent relationship with Lacan, and dramatizing his intellectual journey and troubled personal life.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Louis Althusser is perhaps better remembered for strangling his wife to death during a fit of temporary insanity than for most of his writings (with the possible exception of his essay on the "ideological state apparatus," an explication of normalizing social institutions that has become standard fare in academic postmodernism), but he was one of the key figures in postwar French philosophy. Writings on Psychoanalysis is a collection of essays, article drafts, and correspondence that displays the extent of his intellectual grappling with Freud's writings and with contemporary psychoanalytic theorist Jacques Lacan, a former friend whom Althusser would gradually come to view as a "magnificent and pitiful Harlequin." (Two of the pieces here deal with the 1980 conference at which Althusser vehemently broke with Lacan, ostensibly over the latter's stifling position of dominance among their colleagues.) Writings on Psychoanalysis is a bit heavy-going and theoretical in places, but of unique historical interest.

Review

... tackles topics and problems which are not at all over and done with in the human sciences, namely the relation between philosphy (theory) and (the human) science(s), a theory of historical, non-linear temporality and a theory of the 'decentred' subject... the theses and thoughts unfolded... testify to an exceedingly fertile appropriation of Freud, the long-term effect of which has yet to be assessed.

(European Journal of Social Theory )

Splendidly brought together and presented.... a fascinating group of historical documents.... Revealing.

(Boston Book Review )

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Columbia University Press (April 15, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0231101694
• ISBN-13: 978-0231101691
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #495,727 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Readaptation of Lacanian Theory to the Social "Symptoms", July 1, 2000

By 

Richard, Lee - See all my reviews

This review is from: Writings on Psychoanalysis (Paperback)

The long-lasting controversy over "form" and "content" passes down from Plato. Then, it emerged in the French academics. Writings on Psychoanalys is a text, attempting to fusing the two diverse viewpoints into a wholeness. Initiating from the Freudian and Lacanian, Althusser justifies that the methodology of psychoanalysis is scientific. It's the same of Roland Barthes's The Structuralist Activity in which he takes off the verbal attack from the social Marxists, such as Satre. In the second stance, he appropriates and readapts Lacanian theory to the socail "symptoms" as a psychoanalyst to an analysand. On the one hand, he regulates and justifies for Lacan that psychoanalysis is aculturalistic and not scientific. On the other, it strengthens and expands the scope of Lacanian theory from an individual to an whole society even thouth there are some unjustificabilities within Althusser's appropriation.

2 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Readaptation of Lacanian Theory to the Social "Symptoms", June 30, 2000

By 

Richard, Lee (Taiwan, R. O. C.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Writings on Psychoanalysis (Hardcover)

Writings on Psychoanalysis is a text that first of all deals with Freudian and Lacanian theories. Louis Althusser, as his later books exhibit, elaborates his transformation of Lacanian theories, probing through the social "symptoms" as a psychoanalyst does to a patient. On the one hand, he justifies for Lacan who is often attacked upon his ignorance of the dimension of curlure and society. For the latter puts too much emphasis on the "parole" and the "languge"--structure or form. Althusser, at once a social Marxist and psychoanalyst, sucessfully, readapts Lacan's theories to the society and takes off the verbal attack upon Lacan. On the other, as to Althusser, there seemingly exists no contradictions in a socialist and psychoanalyst even though some critics hold the opposite opinions. Apart from the monumental landmark of this book, Althusser "sublimes" us into another scope of meditation and the applicability of psychoanalysis.