Sadism, Penetration, and the Negotiation of Desire: Commentary on Paper by Csillag

Abstract

The author takes up Csillag’s idea of sadism as the wish to penetrate in the context of a patient who withholds from his analyst. With such a patient, the analyst has to bear the strain stemming from a lack of both satisfaction and recognition–the feeling of not having an impact. The defenses against sadism are examined along with the absence of intentionality in both clinical cases presented, an absence that places sadism in the realm of something that is unconscious or preconscious. Alternative views are offered on the enactment between Csillag and her patient with a focus on the unspoken negotiation of desire and (drawing on Fairbairn) the analyst’s attempt to breach her patient’s closed system of internal objects.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Christopher Bonovitz

Christopher Bonovitz, Psy.D., is Faculty, Supervising & Training Analyst, William Alanson White Institute; Faculty & Supervising Analyst, New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis. Faculty & Supervisor, Mitchell Center for Relational Studies, & Manhattan Institute for Psychoanalysis; Associate Editor, Psychoanalytic Dialogues and Journal of Contemporary Psychoanalysis.