Mourning as explicit and implicit in psychoanalytic theory

In “Mourning and Melancholia,” Freud remarks: “The shadow of the object fell on the ego” (1917). This now famous observation opened the door for the development of object relations theory. For here, Freud implies that basic human character forms through psychic structure, which has been internalized by our relationship with a parent, with whom we both interact and identify. The object, then, is no longer merely the object of an instinctual drive aim, but a live, ever-powerful parental figure always present in our internal world and its psychic operations.