ABSTRACT
Freud’s principal theoretical contributions on this subject are contained in two works, ‘Mourning and melancholia’ and Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety. In ‘Mourning and melancholia’, which was published in 1917, Freud describes the fundamental mechanism of defence against object-loss, showing how depression originates from introjection of the lost object in a split-off part of the ego. A few years later, in 1926, in Inhibitions, Symptoms and Anxiety, he attributed anxiety to the fear of separation and object-loss; this constituted a radical revision of his earlier views on the origin of anxiety. These two essential pillars of Freud’s oeuvre cannot possibly be understood in isolation, and we shall also have to take account of other important texts which foreshadow, illuminate or complement them.
