Madness and Murder

101 Pages·2010·0.323 MB·English

by  Michael Eigen

EIGEN IN SEOUL:
VOLUME ONE,
MADNESS AND MURDER

EIGEN IN SEOUL:
VOLUME ONE,
MADNESS AND MURDER
Michael Eigen
First published in 2010 by
Karnac Books Ltd
118 Finchley Road
London NW3 5HT
Copyright © 2010 by Michael Eigen
The right of Michael Eigen to be identified as the authors of this work has
been asserted in accordance with §§ 77 and 78 of the Copyright Design and
Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior
written permission of the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A C.I.P. for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN-13: 978-1-85575-819-3
Typeset by Vikatan Publishing Solutions (P) Ltd., Chennai, India
Printed in Great Britain
www.karnacbooks.com
CONTENTS
PREFACE vii
CHAPTER ONE
Day 1 1
CHAPTER TWO
Day 2 21
CHAPTER THREE
Day 3 55
REFERENCES 91
v

PREFACE
These seminars were given in Seoul, 2007, on three consecutive days,
six hours per day, a total of eighteen hours. Another set, not yet fully
transcribed, took place two years later. It was a wonderful experi-
ence. Part of what made it wonderful was the chance to dig into the
material in an intense, concentrated way with a very attuned and
helpful group.
I began speaking about madness in psychoanalysis, showing how
important psychosis was for Freud, Klein, Bion and Winnicott. It is
a theme I opened up in my first book, The Psychotic Core in 1986
(republished by Karnac Books, 2004) and felt privileged to be able to
enrich it with learning and experience twenty-one years later.
They say there are no atheists in foxholes. A tantalizing trait of
human nature is our ability to exaggerate in order to convey the
truth of emotional experience. It is an amazing trait, linked with
imagination and the need to communicate, a need to share what is
there. Whether or not there are no atheists in foxholes, we know in
an immediate way what is meant. We share a sense of the horror,
terror, damage and loss such a statement conveys.
In a parallel way, work with madness and trauma requires faith.
A faith allied with skill and caring. Faith in what? It is hard to say.
vii
viii PREFACE
There are many breeds of faith. Perhaps there is something we
might call psychoanalytic or psychotherapeutic faith. Faith in being
together, that in being together something good will happen.
Faith has many tributaries and links with art, music and spiritual
experience, as well as science and skill. Psychoanalytic perception
and sensing is creative. Contact with the unknown is enlivening.
Psychoanalytic inspiration contributes to creative living in those it
touches.
This seminar conveys something of the therapeutic faith, creativ-
ity, learning, and skill shared by Seoul therapists and myself. We
confronted social, familial and individual ills, ills of the human
condition. We shared cases, dilemmas in our lives, dilemmas in
our societies, our world. We explored the riches of psychoanalytic
psychotherapy, what it contributes to ourselves, to people we work
with, to the world at large.
Perhaps most surprising to me was how simpatico we were
together, people from across the world, who never met. We quickly
found deep meeting points and appreciation for mutual aliveness
that continues to grow.
I want to thank my translator and transcriber, Joon ho Lee, him-
self a student of psychoanalysis in the Boston Graduate School of
P sychoanalysis. His feeling for psychoanalysis and the tone and spirit
of my remarks made it possible for the “feel” of what I was saying, as
well as content, to come through. Our “voices” worked together.
Many thanks to Betty Eigen, my partner, who worked out rough
patches and problems in the transcribed manuscript, helping to
make it more readable.
The seminar was sponsored by the Object Relations Institute for
Psychoanalysis in Seoul, founded by Jae hoon Lee, who provided
many nourishing moments for my family and myself and was a
superb overseer of this meeting. Psychoanalysis is alive and well in
Seoul. Not without growing pains, of course. But what I found was a
group of dedicated seekers, open and caring, in touch with the pain
and love of life, eager to do well by those in their charge. Eager to do
right by the depths of their own existence. I hope these pages convey
something of the richness of our experience.
Michael Eigen
January 2010, New York City
CHAPTER ONE
Day 1
Madness in psychoanalysis: Freud and Klein
First let me get the feel of the microphone. Is the sound OK? I was
told that there are some twenty art therapists here. My wife is an art
therapist in addition to being a more general child and adult thera-
pist. So I’m happy to welcome art therapists and everyone else.
I was saying earlier today that I’m happy if in a meeting one
s entence or one phrase that I manage to utter is significant to one
person. If that happens I will be happy and if more than that hap-
pens even better. Meaning is very hard to transmit. Meaning is very
hard to communicate and there is so much noise in our psychic
systems, in our heads, in our souls, that it is very hard to understand
each other, certainly even to understand ourselves, but we’ll give it
a try. I welcome the chance to communicate with you, or try to, and
for you to communicate with me.
I’m going to speak about madness in psychoanalysis. There will
be time for questions, for responses, for your thoughts and feelings.
I like interruptions so feel free to interrupt me anytime about any-
thing as the spirit moves you. Nothing I’m saying is so important
that it can’t be interrupted. Maybe the interruption will be much
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