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Unchained truth and Unconscious VILLAGRA Elsa The one who questions me has to know how to read me Jacques Lacan We only know something about the truth when it is unchained. But: where from is the truth interrogated? – Lacan asks himself, soon before he makes this assertion. The articulation of these two matters will be the main point which I propose to work to situate the question of the position of the analyst and his operation. If the analyst occupies –contingently- the place of the semblant of the object a, what connection can we establish between that place and the truth which gets unchained in the course of an analysis ? I will try to raise some issues as a way of approaching an answer. I believe that considering the semblant as an interrrogative form, promotes the resounding of a main question which has to do with the structure of the subject: Che vuoi? formula that interrogates its place in the desire of the Other. It is in this trend that the analyst supports the setting in tension of the Che vuoi? all along an analysis. In his Écrit : "The Subversion of the Subject…", Lacan introduces this question in between two other interrogations, which seem to be secondary to already existing responses . From which flask is this the opener? From which response is this the universal key signifier? Bringing up this text has the sense of situating the "Che vuoi?" as the way of disarming with that question, the answers that the subject has already given to himself, when he resorts to us demanding an analysis, that is : the ego that ignores, the symptom that limps, and the phantasm that vacilates. All these responses are instances where the truth is half-said, as it always is. How does the analyst then operate and make this main question to resound in his interventions? The paradoxical, the oracular, the equivocal modes, will be some of his resources, trying to avoid the fattening of the symptom with sense, but aiming at the hiatus in his statements, at the interval in the signifying chain.
If the symptom constitutes that anomaly, which conforms the phallic jouissance, the subject complains about this relationship with jouissance but he ignores it. This complaint is one of the ways in which the truth gets enchained. It will depend on the manner in which we intervene before it, that we either turn it more consistent –in other words provoking the consolidation of the chain- or else letting the lack of sense cause its fracture,and thus give way to surprise, eversince the truth is only recognised when it surprises. When the analyst occupies the place of the semblant of object a, it reverses the phantasmatic formula, situated above in the mathema of the analytical discourse. The analyst takes the place of the object cause of desire which splits the subject, thus promoting the falling of the master signifiers. The hysterical discourse- which agent is the divided subject, the analyzant- then arrives in that place. A clinical approach which articulates the phantasm with the signifier is therefore displayed.
I now wish to go back to what is relative to the oracular mode of intervention by the analyst, and I will later continue with the other two modes, the paradoxical and the equivocal modes, because they bring into play the barred big Other, as the bearer of a fundamental lack which produces its interrogative form. The oracular mode is caused by a retroactive temporality which conditions the analyst’s operation. The Unconscious, when desisted, gives testimony that it does not consist but in it. It is mere cut, and is revealed in the flashing time in which it is effected, and in which it vanishes. Its temporality is what " would have been unconcious". Opening and closure, it anticipates while being eclipsed.
Let us know think in the implications of the intervention by means of the misunderstanding. Its basis is made of the same stuff as the Unconscious. Lacan affirms that the Unconscious is a savoir faire with lalangue. When the interpretation operates with the misunderstanding -logical, grammatical or homophonic- it will produce the loss of jouissance that lalangue civilizes.
The half-saying of the interpretation is correlative to the half-said truth and the evanescence of the Unconscious. The joke shows, in a paradigmatic manner, that what is said from the Unconscious participates of the misunderstanding, because the joke produces an equivalence in sound and sense. In this same line, we may place the pun in poetic writing.
Surely, it is possible to establish a connection between the misunderstanding from a logical point of view and the paradoxical mode of interpretation. Lacan makes an occurrent, bright development to deal with this topic. This Seminar displays a presumed dialogue between the audience to which it is directed and the truth, making reference to The Metamathematics from Lorensen. I quote: " It is not a true truth –I say to the Truth- that you tell the truth and you lie at the same time. The Truth may answer many things… It replies: "I tell the truth". You answer back: " I don’t make you tell it ". Then the Truth to fuck you says " I lie ", to which you reply : " I win , I know that you contradict yourself . This is all to it. It can perfectly be affirmed that the Unconscious tells the truth and lies. It is simply up to you to know this. ( Up to here ,Lacan’s quotation) Later on, he says that the truth is denied and that we are always in contact with this fact in an analysis. And he adds: " In other words, that leaves me wishing, that leaves me in a demanding position, because I make a mistake when I believe I am restoring a truth… that can only be recognized as an unchainer. You show what unchainment you are participating in." As a conclusion then: it is not a question of restoring a truth, because this would imply a truth that can be wholly said. The analyst’s interventions will operate with a half-said truth, an oblique saying such as " I don’t make you say it", while promoting at the same time, that this is said. The paradoxical, the oracular and the equivocal modes, as well as the playing with the enigmatic lack of sense, have to do with the analytical operation. The fact that the analyst is comprised in the concept of Unconscious, precisely means that he operates with its same laws. " Inasmuch as a proper interpretation extinguishes the symptom –says Lacan- a truth becomes specific, because it is poetic."
Just like Erasmus in his Praise, makes madness speak in the first person –cleverly making many sound and healthy statements- Lacan makes the truth speak in the same manner, by saying lies which affirm the truth.
Consulted bibliography :
( All texts from Jacques Lacan. |