Sergio Benvenuto

Lacan, Kris and the Psychoanalytic Legacy: The Brain Eater examines the case of a scholar which was commented on by three leading psychoanalysts of the 20th century: Melitta Schmideberg, Ernst Kris, and Jacques Lacan. Sergio Benvenuto unpicks the complex case history of the patient he calls "Professor Brain", a man who struggled to publish his research because of his fixation on plagiarism, and who has never been identified. Benvenuto reconstructs the case through the first-hand accounts of the patient’s analysts and Lacan and sets it in the context of mid-century psychoanalytic debate. As we progress through the patient’s story, Benvenuto explains Lacan’s theories as they apply to the case: the "foreclosure" of orality; obsessional neurosis; mental anorexia; and, above all, the reasons for his opposition to Ego psychology, of which Kris was one of the most important representatives. This book will be of great interest to psychoanalysts in practice and in training, psychiatrists and clinical psychologists. It will also be of interest to academics and scholars of philosophy, the history of psychoanalysis, literature, and cultural studies.

Lacan, Kris and the Psychoanalytic Legacy: The Brain Eater examines the case of a scholar which was commented on by three leading psychoanalysts of the 20th century: Melitta Schmideberg, Ernst Kris, and Jacques Lacan. Sergio Benvenuto unpicks the complex case history of the patient he calls "Professor Brain", a man who struggled to publish his research because of his fixation on plagiarism, and who has never been identified. Benvenuto reconstructs the case through the first-hand accounts of the patient’s analysts and Lacan and sets it in the context of mid-century psychoanalytic debate. As we progress through the patient’s story, Benvenuto explains Lacan’s theories as they apply to the case: the "foreclosure" of orality; obsessional neurosis; mental anorexia; and, above all, the reasons for his opposition to Ego psychology, of which Kris was one of the most important representatives. This book will be of great interest to psychoanalysts in practice and in training, psychiatrists and clinical psychologists. It will also be of interest to academics and scholars of philosophy, the history of psychoanalysis, literature, and cultural studies.

Conversations with Lacan: Seven Lectures for Understanding Lacan brings a unique, non-partisan approach to the work of Jacques Lacan, linking his psychoanalytic theory and ideas to broader debates in philosophy and the social sciences, in a book that shows how it is possible to see the value of Lacanian concepts without necessarily being defined by them.In accessible, conversational language, the book provides a clear-sighted overview of the key ideas within Lacan’s work, situating them at the apex of the linguistic turn. It deconstructs the three Lacanian orders – the symbolic, the imaginary, and the real – as well as a range of core Lacanian concepts, including alienation and separation, après-coup, and the Lacanian doctrine of temporality. Arguing that criticism of psychoanalysis for a lack of scientificity should be accepted by the discipline, the book suggests that the work of Lacan can be helpful in re-conceptualizing the role of psychoanalysis in the future.This accessible introduction to the work of Jacques Lacan will be essential reading for anyone coming to Lacan for the first time, as well as clinicians and scholars already familiar with his work. It will appeal to psychoanalysts, psychotherapists, and scholars of philosophy and cultural studies.

Conversations with Lacan: Seven Lectures for Understanding Lacan brings a unique, non-partisan approach to the work of Jacques Lacan, linking his psychoanalytic theory and ideas to broader debates in philosophy and the social sciences, in a book that shows how it is possible to see the value of Lacanian concepts without necessarily being defined by them.In accessible, conversational language, the book provides a clear-sighted overview of the key ideas within Lacan’s work, situating them at the apex of the linguistic turn. It deconstructs the three Lacanian orders – the symbolic, the imaginary, and the real – as well as a range of core Lacanian concepts, including alienation and separation, après-coup, and the Lacanian doctrine of temporality. Arguing that criticism of psychoanalysis for a lack of scientificity should be accepted by the discipline, the book suggests that the work of Lacan can be helpful in re-conceptualizing the role of psychoanalysis in the future.This accessible introduction to the work of Jacques Lacan will be essential reading for anyone coming to Lacan for the first time, as well as clinicians and scholars already familiar with his work. It will appeal to psychoanalysts, psychotherapists, and scholars of philosophy and cultural studies.

This book explores what we mean when we use the term "perversion." Are we dealing with a sexological classification, a mental disturbance, an ethical deviation, a hedonistic style, or an historical-cultural artifact? The book retraces some of the fundamental stages in the field of psychoanalytic thought-from Freud to Masud Khan, Stoller, and Lacan-and proposes an original approach: that "paraphilias" today are taken as an ethical failure of the sexual relationship with the other. The perversions signal a specific relationship with the other, who is treated not simply as a sexual object, but someone whose subjectivity is ably exploited precisely in order to get a perverse pleasure. Acts, if considered perverse, are understood as a metaphorical re-edition of a trauma, above all sexual, in which the subject (as a child) suffered the bitter experience of exclusion or jealousy.

This book explores what we mean when we use the term "perversion." Are we dealing with a sexological classification, a mental disturbance, an ethical deviation, a hedonistic style, or an historical-cultural artifact? The book retraces some of the fundamental stages in the field of psychoanalytic thought-from Freud to Masud Khan, Stoller, and Lacan-and proposes an original approach: that "paraphilias" today are taken as an ethical failure of the sexual relationship with the other. The perversions signal a specific relationship with the other, who is treated not simply as a sexual object, but someone whose subjectivity is ably exploited precisely in order to get a perverse pleasure. Acts, if considered perverse, are understood as a metaphorical re-edition of a trauma, above all sexual, in which the subject (as a child) suffered the bitter experience of exclusion or jealousy.