ABSTRACT

Psychoanalytic Perspectives on the Shadow of the Parent explores the psychological challenges faced by the offspring of either famous or notorious parents.

Beginning with parental legacies found in mythology and the Bible, the book presents a series of case studies drawn from a range of narrative contexts, selecting personalities drawn from history, politics, psychoanalysis and literature, all viewed from an analytic perspective. The concluding section focuses on the manifestation of this parental shadow within the field of fine art, as written by artists themselves.  

This is a lively and varied collection from a fascinating range of contributors. It provides readers with a new understanding of family history, trauma and reckoning screened through a psychoanalytic perspective, and will appeal to psychoanalysts, psychotherapists, counsellors and anyone interested in the dynamics of the family.

chapter |3 pages

Introduction

part I|65 pages

Perspectives

part |13 pages

In the Bible

chapter Chapter 1|11 pages

In the shadow of violence

Isaac and Abraham

part |20 pages

In Greek mythology and opera

chapter Chapter 2|18 pages

Hard acts hard to follow

Sophocles, Hofmannsthal, Strauss and Elektra

part |29 pages

In Shakespeare

chapter Chapter 3|15 pages

Under the shadow of silence

On speechless love in King Lear

chapter Chapter 4|12 pages

“Madness, yet there’s method in it”

The shadow of the doctor in Hamlet’s mirror

part II|172 pages

‘I’-witness accounts

part |70 pages

In psychoanalysis

chapter Chapter 5|18 pages

‘Derealization’

In the shadow of the son

chapter Chapter 6|12 pages

Her mother’s footsteps

chapter Chapter 7|22 pages

A tragic inheritance

The irresolvable conflict for children of perpetrators 1

chapter Chapter 8|16 pages

Making my way out of the shadow into the sun

A painful confrontation with my past

part |33 pages

In socio-political life

chapter Chapter 9|16 pages

Closed doors

chapter Chapter 10|15 pages

Kafka

‘Parental superiority’ as the act that feels hard to follow

part |16 pages

In philosophy

part |15 pages

In religion and family life

chapter Chapter 12|13 pages

The eye begins to see

Personal reflections on a fragmented father–son relationship, and other related matters

part |34 pages

Reflections in fine art

chapter Chapter 13|12 pages

Shadow, colour, glass

The family I knew and the family I never knew

chapter Chapter 14|20 pages

Paddle your own canoe

Negotiating the shadows