The Crises of Oedipus

Abstract

This article describes the various crises of the Oedipus complex. In the beginning, I address the crisis of the first traumatic days when Oedipus was to be abandoned in the wilderness. This early breakdown takes place at what may be denoted as stage zero. During this first crisis, the defensive solution is an act of doubling, according to Quinodoz's dédoublement of the parental pair, accompanied by the defenses of splitting, foreclosure, and annihilation. Protected by these defenses, the child would be able to search for a solution to the neurotic part of the Oedipus complex. According to Freud's and Lacan's conception, these phases encompass the stages of the imaginary omnipotence, of the symbolic prohibition, and the symbolic reconciliation. The second crisis of Oedipus signifies therefore that the desire encounters the prohibition of the third (e.g., the father). I will show these stages in the 1967 film adaptation of Oedipus Rex and the life of its director, Pierre Paolo Pasolini. Against this background, the third crisis of Oedipus is considered: the impending ecological catastrophe.

Keywords:

• Oedipus complex
• crisis
• dédoublement
• evental side
• Pier Paolo Pasolini
• ecological catastrophe

Notes

1 Original Italian title, Edipo Re

2 The “evental site” is—in topological terms—the area around the real, i.e., an unrepresented but actualized event. In this area, symbolic or imaginary representations can exist (e.g., like planets, satellites, or meteors orbiting around the real).

3 Dédoublement (dichotomization) means: Firstly, there is a division (e.g., the division of a class or of the personality) that furthers a duplication (e.g., as a special train or an expansion, for example, of a motorway). Dédoublement may also have the sense of chasing after something. As the term seems to be multifaceted and rather ambiguous, I will use in the following the French term.

4 With Hegel, a dialectical process begins here in which the Theban as well as the Corinthian parents are negated. He describes this step as “a process of splitting up what is simple and undifferentiated” (“Entzweiung des Einfachen”) and a process of duplicating and setting factors in opposition (“entgegensetzende Verdopplung”) (Hegel 2001a, p. 81; in German, Hegel 2016, p. 23). In Corinth, i.e., in the relationship between Polybos and Merope, the Theban parents are negated. The real trauma is foreclosed and the void is split off. Laios is the negated Other of Polybos. Iokaste is the negated Other of Merope. From the Corinthian perspective, the cruel pain of Thebes is negated, i.e., the real trauma that Laios and Iokaste inflicted on their child is foreclosed. From the Theban perspective, the peace-loving Polybos and Merope are the negated others. In this first negation, there is a limit or limitation (“Schranke”) between the duplicated pairs of parents (Hegel 2001b, p. 38; in German, Hegel 2017, p.118).

5 To reconsider the Hegelian dialectics of the dédoublement, there is a threefold dialectical movement in the complete Oedipus complex: The dialectic of trauma and conflict, such as the dialectic regarding the relationship between trauma and conflict: (1) In the trauma, the negation consists in the fact that the trauma is foreclosed and split off as a void. The return of the foreclosed, in the form of murder and marriage, seems to be the second negation, the negation of the negation; (2) In the case of conflict, the negation consists of repression and the return of the repressed, for example in the form of dreams, wrong actions, or body symbols form the negation of negation; (3) Regarding the relationship between trauma and conflict, the negation of negation arises when one pair of the (internalized) parents is sublated in the other and something new arises: the trauma is inscribed (sublated) in the neurosis, and the neurosis is inscribed (sublated) in the trauma. The proximity of the trauma triggered big fears in Oedipus. He had to flee Corinth to protect his parents from the murderous and incestuous impulses of revenge. However, the trauma may also trigger a particularly strong repression. On the other hand, the neurotic conflict could dictate the return of the rejected (i.e., of having been rejected by the parents) with a specific direction, namely to kill the father and marry the mother.

6 I owe this expression to Martin Weimer, a psychoanalyst in Kiel, Germany.

7 Loewald (1979, p. 756 ff.) speaks of the crime of parricide, regarding the neurotic part of the Oedipus complex. In stage three, even this crime of parricide can lead to responsibility and self-autonomy due to a rather mild superego. The awareness of a parricide that concerns not only the parents, but also the earth, the animals, and mankind’s future could therefore lead to a deeper responsibility and self-autonomy. From this perspective, the awareness of a parricide would be the prerequisite of a mature development which does take care of the world.

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Notes on contributors

Lutz Goetzmann

Lutz Goetzmann is a professor at the University of Lübeck, Germany and a director of the Institute for Philosophy, Psychoanalysis and Cultural Studies in Berlin. Formerly the head physician of Germany’s Clinic for Psychosomatic Medicine, he currently has a psychoanalytic practice in Berlin.