Phantom Threads

In this essay I contrast Freud’s account of mourning in Mourning and Melancholia to that of Merleau-Ponty in Phenomenology of Perception. In suggesting a somatic as well as a psychic response, Merleau-Ponty, I argue, more accurately accounts for the ways in which we experience loss and why, contrary...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Oxford literary review 2022-07, Vol.44 (1), p.17-26
Main Author: Young, Robert J.C
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
French literature
Freud, Sigmund (1856-1939)
Grief
Literary Studies
Merleau-Ponty, Maurice (1908-1961)
Proust, Marcel (1871-1922)
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:In this essay I contrast Freud’s account of mourning in Mourning and Melancholia to that of Merleau-Ponty in Phenomenology of Perception. In suggesting a somatic as well as a psychic response, Merleau-Ponty, I argue, more accurately accounts for the ways in which we experience loss and why, contrary to Freud’s suggestion, mourning’s work is never completed.
ISSN:0305-1498
1757-1634
DOI:10.3366/olr.2022.0373