ABSTRACT
Panic is a frequently anticipated but rarely occurring reaction to disaster. The primal scene contains many of the elements of the scene of panic. There is the impact of body on body, the mutual damage being read in by the bewildered child who mistakes the act for one of sadistic violence. The image of the primal scene may find a disguised counterpart in the image of panic, and may contribute to the terrifying fascination of the latter image. Perhaps the myth from which the word “panic” comes may also give us a clue to a recurrent situation which underlies the fantasy of panic. The myth of Pan gives us the elements of ‘disturbed sleep, anger, frightening noise, and extreme terror. In general being trapped, finding oneself in an extreme danger situation from which escape routes are blocked or about to be cut off, rouses intense terror and is apt to set off precipitate flight.
