Abstract
The fifth exercise of the workbook asks the reader to write what they see in a mirror. The particularity of the exercise’s request is discussed presenting data from the research showing that the exercise took participants in two directions: one that included autobiographical reference to oneself and one that did not. This exercise also confused some participants into not writing in their usual style, troubling their fantasy. A final case study of a participant’s writing fantasy is explored via the analysis of a moment of disarticulation in his spoken discourse as potentially revealing aspects of this fantasy. Charalambous offers guidelines at the end to help the reader examine the text produced to this exercise and compare it with previous texts and responses.
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Notes
- 1.
I am using single quotes when using other people’s words—thus this is a phrase Q used verbatim.
- 2.
Jouissance relates to plus-de-jouir (in English called a surplus jouissance), which is what the subject can only access of jouissance in her entering of the social world. This plus-de-jouir is produced through an Imaginary prohibition, to cover over the impossibility of attaining jouissance (Braunstein 2003, pp. 138–9). Objet a is linked to plus-de-jouir , according to Evans (1996, pp. 128–9). The objet a is the agalma of the pursuit of the primordial state of jouissance (Nusselder 2013, p. 75) and has been translated onto the ‘sign,’ primary master signifier and further into secondary identifications/signifiers.
- 3.
I am not implying that every writer has an ‘agenda’ but rather there are points when we are aware of how we wish to portray ourselves as writers sometimes; and even when we are supposedly “unaware” there is a determination that might run unconsciously that positions us in an Imaginary agenda of an Other.
- 4.
The reference to ‘Ancient Greece’ and my education in Classics made me think that this might be referring to me (being Greek). Though my being Greek had to be concluded from my surname only as participants did not receive any personal information about me. Though the reference to ‘mermaid’ was also strange as this participant is male, not to perpetuate gender stereotypes here of what a male might fantasize, but from my Imaginary perspective it did not fit with Q’s overall gender performance (Butler 1990).
- 5.
Q’s reference (to me?) in his fifth text which was also mentioned in the previous section about the exercise’s compositional effects:Verse
Verse There are fingerprints / around where her face sits. maybe I’m done now. Maybe I’ll deflect back on Zoe. Her fringe, the double necklace she’s wearing, how because she’s not at my angle, she can’t see that I see her. Wow I sound stalkerish. Better stop now.’
- 6.
Ironically, ‘aphanisis’ is a Greek word meaning to eliminate, to eradicate and my questions seemed to have provoked it.
References
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Butler, J. (1990). Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. London and New York: Routledge.
Evans, D. (1996). An Introductory Dictionary of Lacanian Psychoanalysis. London and New York: Routledge.
Hecq, D. (2005). Uncanny Encounters: On Writing, Anxiety and Jouissance. Double Dialogues 6: Anatomy and Poetics. [Online no pages]. Retrieved from http://www.doubledialogues.com
Nusselder, A. (2013). The Surface Effect: The Screen of Fantasy in Psychoanalysis. London and New York: Routledge.
Verhaeghe, P., & Declercq, F. (2002). Lacan’s Analytical Goal: “Le Sinthome” or the Feminine Way. In L. Thurston (Ed.), Essays on the Final Lacan. Re-inventing the Symptom (pp. 59–83). New York: The Other Press. Retrieved from http://www.psychoanalysis.ugent.be/pages/nl/artikels/artikels%20Paul%20Verhaeghe/English%20symptom.pdf
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Charalambous, Z. (2019). Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall, Who Is the Writer among Them All?. In: Writing Fantasy and the Identity of the Writer. Palgrave Studies in Creativity and Culture. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20263-7_9
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