Conclusion

Abstract

According to Robert Graves (2011 [1955], p. 287), Narcissus had ‘a stubborn pride in his own beauty’. His many admirers he rejected ‘heartlessly’. He was vain, having good reason to believe in his own beauty, but his flaw was his failure to recognise others — the value of their regard — and this led to his downfall. Cursed with an affliction that materialised this flaw, he perished. He perished, in other words, because he turned away from the other, loved only himself, and loved only the surface image of himself. Likewise, in Freudian theory, narcissism refers to those who derive ‘complete satisfaction’ from their own bodies, treating them as they would ordinarily treat the body of another. Much more recently, Lasch (1991 [1979], p. 5) said of narcissistic modern society, ‘To live for the moment is the prevailing passion — to live for yourself, not for your predecessors or posterity’. Taken together these interpretations propose a broadly common view of vanity: more than just an excessive sense of self-worth, or a tendency to self-absorption, vanity entails the complete exclusion of the other.