May Seminar 2020

NIDA LACAN STUDY AND READING GROUP

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Seminar V: Formations of the Unconscious (VII)

Fantasy and Beyond the Pleasure Principle

OEDIPUS: A holy mystery that no tongue may name.

Lacan begins by probing a series of ideas from his contemporary psychoanalysts, Ernest Jones,
Otto Rank, Hanns Sachs, including Freud, when he theorizes that signifiers play a significant role
in forming the symptoms, perversion, and neurosis, for example. Similarly, in perversion and
neurosis, the same structure of conciliation, sidestepping, and the dialectic of the repressed and
return of the repressed comes into play. In perversion, the subject does not recognize what
includes in the repressed. If he does otherwise, he must recognize other things, including the
intolerable repressed articulation or what Lacan calls articulated signifying chain, which in the
meantime, defines the conceptualization of repression. That is what happens in neurosis as well.
The subject continues to deny the recognition of something that seems necessary. Both neurosis
and perversion are identified with such an omission (lack of recognition) of a fundamental
Oedipal element. Still, there is one difference between the two, and that is that in neurosis, the
drive is avoided, whereas, in perversion, the drives as signifiers of instincts are active in their full
swing. That implies that fantasy plays a significant role in perversion, which offers the subject an
imaginary satisfaction. In fantasy, the relationship of the subject to reality is imaginary and
coordinated with signifiers. The fetishistic objects should not be accounted for the instinctual
economy, as Lacan argues.

They are instrumental elements isolated in a form that is too symbolic for it to be
possible to misunderstand this for a moment, once one has explored the lived reality of
perversion. (Lacan, 2017, 218)

Lacan then reexamines Freud's infantile fantasy of 'a child is being beaten.'
Before expounding on his analysis, let us briefly review Freud’s essay of 1919 of the same title
where he develops his theory of the infantile fantasy of beating that he recollected mainly from
his patients, most of whom were girls. Freud himself articulated in linguistic terms the whole
infantile fantasy of beating into three statements. While the primal scene (compulsive repetition
of the scene, subject, and object) in the fantasy is his main ground for theorization, he divides
the case history into three statements with enormous signifying inspiration.

1. My father is beating the child.

The first and the third phases are conscious statements where the father is the one who is
beating, but the child is unknown in the first statement. Freud considers the second phase as the
one that remains unconscious associated with repression. The first and second phases, according
to Freud, are sadistic. The third phase depicts masochism as the object (the child) of the first
and the second statements turn into the ego. However, the one who produces this fantasy is one
child. The transformation of sadism into masochism is a result of the guilt that the fanaticizing
child carries around. Freud argues that the beating fantasy bears evidence that "there seems to
be a confirmation of the view that masochism is not the manifestation of a primary instinct, but
that which originates from sadism which has been turned round upon the self—that is to say,
through regression from an object to the ego. Instinct with a passive aim must be taken for
granted as existing, especially among women," (Freud, 1993, 180). Freud highlights two crucial
aspects, namely erotic and satisfaction concerning infantile jealousy and the child's egoistic
comforts. Still, Freud claims that it is not crystal clear that we identify the beating fantasy 'sexual'
or 'sadistic.' The division between 'sexual' and 'sadistic' get blurry when we take the fantasy to its
source. Here Freud recalls the inherited ambiguity in the prophecy of three witches in the first
act of Macbeth. The prediction portrays Macbeth as happy and not happy, for he will never be a
king, but he will reach his primary goal. In the same way, "Not clearly sexual, not in itself
sadistic, but yet the stuff from which both will later come," (173).

First With: "Lesser than Macbeth, and greater

Freud concludes his thesis that the stirring force that forms the symptom and its principle
substance (perversion and neurosis) is related to the Oedipus complex, as the "nuclear complex
of neurosis," (Freud, 1993, 193). Freudian scholars believe that the fantasy of beating is gathered
from observing his talented Anna's (his daughter) infantile recounts. Anna and Ernst, the
champion of the fort/da game, both became psychoanalysts. Anna Freud also wrote her seminal
essay, "Beating Fantasies and Daydreams."

The case, in fact, was her own [Anna Freuds’], and given that her analysis with Freud was
taking place in 1919, it is clear that the material Freud dealt with in his study of the
beating phantasy was rather close to home. (Leader, 2000, 154)

To return to view what is Lacan's take on the Freudian beating fantasy. The first thing that
strikes us is the Lacan's adjustment of the Oedipus complex that, for Freud, was the crucial
constituting factor in the development of an individual and the whole civilization. However,
looking at the Oedipus complex stages here, Lacan is still in league with Freud. Lacan examines
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the above three statements as a script with multiple theatricalities for the subject is playing a role
which is determined by his imaginary relationship to reality, and the apparatus of the signifier
conforms to this imaginary relationship. Important in this process is the visual qualities of the
fantasy and the subject's ability to claim libidinal satisfaction. The subject in the statement
indicates that she is interested more to be the spectator, even as the third statement suggests she
is being beaten. The person who does the beating is someone in a position of authority such as a
schoolteacher, an all-powerful man, the King, or a tyrant that Lacan sums up in the signifier of
the Name-of-the-Father. Lacan demonstrates his interest in transformations, antecedents, and its
underlying history that the analysis empowered Freud to see. Lacan calls these potentials "the
avatars of the fantasy," (Lacan, 2017, 220). The first statement that characterizes the first phase
(translated in the seminar as stage) of the fantasy implies that the beaten one is a sibling, sister, or
brother of the subject. By quoting from Macbeth, Freud suggests that this phase of the fantasy is
between sexual or sadistic. Lacan reads this as a literary representation of the coexistence
between the life and death instincts. The father satisfies the fantasizing subject's jealousy by not
loving and humiliating the child. Lacan states that here, "the subject is targeted in his existence as
a subject," (Ibid). For him, the fantasy in this phase was tied up with the pre-Oedipal stage.

'My father does not love him' is the meaning of the primitive fantasy and it's what gives
the subject pleasure—the other isn't loved, that is, isn't established in a properly symbolic
relationship. This is the perspective from which the father's intervention acquires its
primary value for the subject, on which everything that follows depends…We are prior
to the Oedipus complex, and yet the father is there. (121)

As the statement unfolds, the second phase exposes the subject with a privileged relation with
the father, for it signifies that the father is beating her rival sibling. The second phase of the
fantasy is in the Oedipus complex, for the subject in her Oedipal desire finds herself the father's
favorite. The third phase begins as the third statement signifies the subject arising from the
Oedipus complex. Due to the repression, the subject reveals the ultimate authority of the father
as a high-handed figure. That is why in the post-Oedipal stage, the master signifier, the Name-
of-the-Father, signifies the signifying chan. This signifier remains veiled because it is in its nature
as a signifier.

The phallus enters into play immediately the subject addresses the mother's desire. This
phallus is veiled and will remain veiled to the end of time for one simple reason, which is
that it's an ultimate signifier in the signifier's relationship with signified. (223)

For Lacan, the importance of the play of signifiers in fantasy creates a sense and meaning effects.
For example, in the masochistic fantasy in the infantile life, we do not have an evolution of the
instinct but a crucial signifier that Lacan calls the 'whip'. This signifier has a central position in
the stream of the signifier that Lacan calls 'hieroglyphs'. This centrality signifies the importance
of the 'hieroglyph' holding the whip and acts as "director, the governor, and the master," (225).
The visual signification in the first phase of fantasy suggests that the subject has no rival, and he
is expelled from the signifying chain. In the second phase, there is a rival as the statement
approves it, 'My father is beating the child whom I hate.' and in the third phase, as its statement
implies, the subject fantasizes the beating on himself because it identifies an exit from the
Oedipal triangle by imposing castration. The Oedipus complex for Freud was a "proper name of
this infantile death-wish," (Gallop, 1985, 168). A year after Freud presented his theory of
masochism, he recourse to the importance of masochism in his postulation, beyond the pleasure
principle. The last statement, I am Being Beaten by my Father, reveals that the subject reiterates his
own beating as an experienced event, which for Freud and Lacan, a manifestation of the death
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instinct. The signifier's materiality, represented as Lacan, argues, by the 'whip,' and its law. This
phase of the fantasy, as such, demonstrates the relationship between the subject and the signifier.
The enclosure of masochism in the beyond the pleasure principle points toward the subject's
"mode of resistance or inertia" (Lacan, 2017, 226) in this enclosure. This means for Lacan that
the pleasure principle itself is an indication of a predisposition of life to return to an inanimate
status. That, according to Lacan, is a return to "the zero tension…the last resort of libidinal
evolution is to return to the stillness of a stone." (Ibid). At this point, the pleasure principle is
located beyond the pleasure principle. This state, a 'mummification' of the subject, as Lacan calls
it in The Television, was named by Freud following a suggestion by Barbara Low, 'the Nirvana
principle.' For Freud, Nirvana was a principle of the evolution of all living species that
instinctively wish to reach a state of consistency in eternal death. That means that the pleasure
does not end in this desire but increases to its climax. Freud insists that the adverse reaction
[negative reaction] during analysis signifies such an inbuilt instinct. Lacan invokes the last word
of Oedipus, me phenai "of Oedipus at Colonus [verse 1224], in the 'would that I were not,' which
means 'not to have been borne,'” (Lacan, 2015, 301). Lacan hints at me phenai that implies not
having been borne was an unconscious expression that Oedipus makes. The real meaning of
this expression is that having been borne was his destiny.

This remark that Oedipus ends up making, his μή φύναι (me phunai), as the final word that
gives the meaning in which the adventure of tragedy culminates, does not abolish the
latter, far from it. On the contrary, it eternalizes it, for the simple reason that, if Oedipus
was unable to succeed in stating it, he would not be the supreme hero that he is. (Lacan,
2017, 227)

In Seminar VIII: Transference, Lacan further clarify this when he gives an example in French.

In an expression like je crains qu’il ne vienne [“I am afraid he may (not) come” or “I cannot
but fear he is coming”] or avant qu’il n’apparaisse [“before he not but appear”]. It appears
to be an expletive in such contexts, according to grammarians, whereas it is precisely
there that the tip of desire’s iceberg appears—not the subject of the statement who is
“I,” he who is currently speaking, but the subject in which enunciation finds its origin.
(Lacan, 2015, 301)

Lacan states that Freud postulated that at the end of the beyond the pleasure principle lies the
subject’s inclination for a permanent respite in death. As such, a harmony between the eros and
thanatos (life and death instincts) will sustain. For Freud, this was the truth of each living being.
Thanatos reveals itself in a subject aggressive response to his surroundings and partly remains as
the pain of being’. Lacan also confirms that this adverse reaction to therapy in his clinical
experience happens to his patient, an irresistible ‘suicide’, self-annihilation, and a tendency to
walk away from treatment.

In sum, Lacan spells out Freud's remarkable beating fantasy and its division into neurotic and
pervert. He reintegrates Freud’s orthodox consideration into his theorization with his linguistic
system. Lacan shows fantasy as support of desire and, in fact, a stage that desire comes into play
when the subject is submitted to the signifier and its law. The dynamic behind this show of
desire lies in the Oedipus complex, during which the subject oscillates between her parents. The
subject tends to be hidden in fantasy (in dreams and daydreaming). However, his presence as a
protagonist and the determiner persists in the drama. In fantasy, “the subject sustains himself as
desiring in relation to an even more complex signifying ensemble,” (Lacan, 1994, 185). The
fantasy shows the subject divided and split, left alone with the object petit a. That is the
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definition of Lacan’s famous formula of fantasy, $<>a. In perversion, this formula reverses
into a<>$. Lacan reaffirms his fantasy position in the unpublished Seminar XIV: The Logic of
Fantasy that always distinguishes the subject and object a in a signifying arrangement where the
earlier is put on ‘the pedestal’. The second part of the session highlights the origin of masochism
in the fantasy that is linked with beyond the pleasure principle. He agrees with Freud that
beyond the pleasure principle is the domain of the death drive. That crosses the border between
the pleasure principle and beyond pleasure. When the pleasure crosses the border, it doesn’t
mean that the pleasure tends to subside. On the contrary, the pleasure in beyond the pleasure
principles evolves as the climax of the pleasure.

Note
Freud, Sigmund, 1993, "A Child is Being Beaten," On Psychopathology: Inhibition, Symptoms and
Anxiety and Other Workers, The Penguin Freud Library, Vol 10, tr. James Strachey, Penguin
Books, London.

Gallop, Jane, 1985, Reading Lacan, Cornell University Press, Ithaca.

Lacan, Jacques, 1994, Seminar XI: The Four Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis, tr. Alan Sheridan,
ed. Jacques-Alain Miller, Penguin Books, London.

——2015, Seminar VIII: Transference, tr. Bruce Fink, ed. Jacques-Alain Miller, Polity Press,
Cambridge.

——2017, Seminar V: Formations of the Unconscious, tr. Russell Grigg, ed. Jacques-Alain Miller,
Polity Press, Cambridge.

Leader, Darian, 2000, Freud's Footnotes, faber faber, London.

© National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA)