Cormac McCarthy's The Road

by Lycia ALexander-Guerra, MD

A road, a journey, the myriad of metaphors for life or life experiences, and for an analyst, a metaphor for the experience of psychoanalysis itself. But the 2007 Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Road by Cormac McCarthy [who also won the National Book Award for All the Pretty Horses, (1992)], a book of "gratitude" dedicated to his young son John Francis, is almost too much to bear. I recall writing the film review, based on another of McCarthy's novels, No Country for Old Man, and alluding to psychoanalysis as no country for the faint of heart. The opening page of The Road had me reevaluating thinking myself of pretty strong constitution. McCarthy writes "the frailty of everything revealed at last."

I thought the novel might be describing the metaphoric annihilation of a severely depressed person, an existential angst par excellence of aloneness in a cruel world. The father in The Road says "if only my heart were a stone." And he recognizes that "he could not enkindle in the heart of the child what was ashes in his own." The Road is profoundly sad, but, unlike depression, beautiful. Tenderness and sacrifice evident in a yellow toy truck or a half packet of cocoa. Frighteningly, aliveness seemed to interrupt the relentless deadness only in passages that described a kind of kill-or-be-killed mentality, and a spark of love or tenderness almost too much to bear. I thought of patients who cut themselves.

There is a kind of 'be here now' to their lives, whether vigilant for marauders or a swim in a mountain pool. There is no past, and no place to be. The compelling reality is the search for food and for shoes.

The terse sentences, the paucity of dialogue, the bleakness, all reminded me of Hemingway, but, in The Road, even with the man sometimes dreaming of "aching blue" sky, or of his bride, or of flowering woods, there is no room here to entertain illusion, as Jake (The Sun Also Rises) thought Brett might, evident in his question to her, the book's last line: "Isn't it pretty to think so?" The Road has not a chapter, not a name (except Papa; and a name used as a lie); with almost every thing barren, sometimes not even a completed sentence, not an apostrophe, save one, for contractions, the daylight, grudging, the sun, indifferent. Corpses grimace, and the mummied dead are everywhere.

The boy is (understandably) frightened, alot. Perhaps the most heartbreaking of all is the recognition of what children in this (our) world always bear. The father, exhausted, irritable, tells his son, "You are not the one who has to worry about everything." The boy replies, "Yes, I am. I am the one."

Though the environs in The Road stand in stark contrast to descriptions of nature's lushness in McCarthy's The Orchard Keeper, I was nonetheless reminded by The Road of the journey of Inman, in Charles Frasier's Cold Mountain, on his intrepid trek, plodding through starvation, murdering marauders, and cold. But in The Road the man and his son trek through a nuclear winter of total destruction. If there is parallel devastation for Inman, it was what he thought became of goodness within himself, whereas the boy in The Road still carries the "fire" within, and his father believes this enough to keep them both alive against all odds for as long as necessary. Sometimes the analyst carries the belief inside, enough to propel analyst and analysand through the devastation. Sometimes it is the analysand who is responsible.

Perhaps in the last line of her NY Times review (Sep 25, 2006) of The Road, Janet Maslin said it best: "'The Road' offers nothing in the way of escape or comfort. But its fearless wisdom is more indelible than reassurance could ever be." Another Janet, Janet Malcom, might have written that about psychoanalysis, had she read The Road before writing The Impossible Profession.

key words: psychoanalytic literary criticism, Cormac McCarthy

Links to the blog posts about David Brooks's article and Empathy in Children have now been added to the posts.

The links to the articles in the blog posts about the David Brooks article, and empathy in young children, have now been added to the posts.

Edward H. Stein

Has David Brooks become a relationalist?

Has David Brooks, the usually-conservative New York Times columnist, become a relationalist or a contestualist?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/opinion/12brooks.html

Edward H. Stein

New Study Shows Children Ages 7-12 Are Hard-Wired for Empathy

A new study by two University of Chicago students has demonstrated that children ages 7 t0 12 years are hard-wired for empathy. Their MRI studies demonstrating their findings, with graphics MRI images, are at the above link. Their studies demonstrated that the areas of the brain associated with moral reasoning are activated when the children see pain inflicted upon others. These are similar to findings that have previously been demonstrated in adults.

http://chronicle.uchicago.edu/080814/empathy.shtml

Edward H. Stein

SPLITS IN PSYCHOANALYTIC COMMUNITIES
(AND IN TAMPA BAY)

By Arnold Z. Schneider, Ph.D., ABPP


JULY 9, 2008. Today marks the 6 month anniversary since a group of psychoanalysts and psychotherapists from TBIPS announced via an internet message that they were resigning from the parent group and initiating a new psychoanalytic-psychotherapy training program. There had been absolutely no discussion or warning of this thought or decision in the group as a whole of this forthcoming event despite the fact that it must have been the focus of many secretive meetings long before the event occurred. To my knowledge there has been no discussion between the two groups since the event occurred.

While I assume my share of the responsibility for what led up to this split - and it is most likely a major share - I do not believe it merited the abrupt decision, the non-discussion attitude, of the resigning group. Certainly, we all had a part in the split. I believe that a major reason for the split was the absence of our ability (willingness) to speak openly and directly about our feelings, about the process taking place in the group in which we all participated, and of our being unable (unwilling) to take responsibility for them. In this regard, I believe that most of us were following the dictates of our early training experiences and identifications which dictated that we remain opaque.

It is very interesting that our then President had handed out an article by Kenneth Eisold (1994) (someone I had urged us to invite as a consultant to (for) the group and had spoken with) shortly before the split took place. The following is a brief and incomplete review of his paper, The Intolerance of Diversity in Psychoanalytic Institutes. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 75, 785-800. I believe it helps explain some of the reasons this unfortunate schism happened.

Splits (schisms, defections) within psychoanalytic communities have been common phenomena since the origin of psychoanalysis. Beginning with Freud and his splits from Jung, Adler, Forenczi, and others, the tradition has continued to include the five splits in this country (Washington/Baltimore, Philadelphia, Boston, Cleveland, and Los Angeles), and internationally in France, Germany, Austria, Sweden, Norway, Spain, Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Venezuela, Columbia, and Australia (not to mention the struggles in England between Anna Freud and Melanie Klein). Also, there have been intense rivalries between the American Psychoanalytic Association and the International Psychoanalytic Association (eg., over the question of Lay Analysis) and within the Division of Psychoanalysis between Section 1 and Section 5.

There have been many attempts to understand and explain the origin and development of these painful splits, primarily focusing on the historical tradition, group functioning, social systems, organizations involved, individual (personality) factors, etc.. Narcissistic, superego, and “pathological” identification characteristics of the leaders are often cited as key elements in the dissolution of groups. While all of the rancorous aspects on both sides of the schism are part and parcel of these splits, in a paper published in 1994, Kenneth Eisold points to the dynamics of “social defence” --loneliness and intolerance-- as important aspects in the nature of analytic work of the analyst.

First, he points to the “nature of the work” (the isolation, loneliness, demands) which leave the analyst vulnerable to seek out a sense of certainty on his/her strict reliance on psychoanalytic theory (“loyalty”) , often connected to early training experiences, leaving out (defending against, rejecting, splitting off, dissociating) alternative theories.

A second factor, “The nature of membership” refers to the analyst’s need for acceptance by the group which plays itself out in such important issues as self-esteem, acceptance, referrals, etc.. The importance of belonging in each one of us -- for varied reasons -- is an incredibly important motivation. Belonging becomes interpreted (experienced) as a privilege and is reinforced by being the one who or a member of the group which rejects others (institute groups, theories, individuals). Eisold refers to the basis of this dynamic to be in the “pairing that goes on between patient and analyst (along generational lines) which leaves the organization experienced ambivalently “(Eisold adds “resented”). At the very same time, the need for a home often results in the diverting (displacement) of those negative feelings onto another group, theory, or analyst.

The third set of factors Eisold points to relates to the “psychoanalytic culture”. The analytic culture has been opposed to all other cultures (“I know what is best”) and, as a result, acts in an authoritarian (closed, one-person) way. Not only do they reject other theories, groups, etc., but they feel attacked (violated) by other ways of thinking. Consider the reaction of most early classical analysts toward the use of medication and contemporary models of psychoanalysis. Eisold labels this phenomenon “privileged apartness” .

I believe that all three of these factors were involved in this split. The need for certainty, the importance of belonging, and our culture were clearly factors which entered the group. There was little discussion of these factors among ourselves and, perhaps, little thought about how they were playing themselves out.

Eisold’s paper contains many more ideas and subtleties than I have expressed in this brief summary. I urge all to read it. Of course, each side of the schism contributes, and as he points out, the “bystander “ contributes as much as the victim or perpetrator. Where or when does the schism end? Never? How might it end? Certainly we analysts believe in the “talking cure”, but the “talking cure” is an intensely complicated process. The built in defensive, narcissistic, subjective, identificatory models are certainly important unconscious mechanisms which keep us all apart. ALL of us participate. I believe we must accept that these battles will continue through the life of psychoanalysis. There is no permanent repair or fix, but only for analysts of all persuasions to come to accept the ongoing cacophony of differing ideas, experiences, and perceptions and then use them in a dialogue with one another -- to be open to different understandings of the nature of the content and process. Psychoanalysis is clearly a science, an art and a philosophy and we must WORK TOWARD integrating these functions, knowing we will never get there. But we must all agree to work in that direction, not splitting off.

Certainly a “third” -- a consultant -- would have been quite a help; an analyst for the group and someone who could listen (in a relatively unbiased way) and therefore hear, see, experience, and shed light on that process. Certainly the consultant has to be expected to have his/her biases also, but perhaps the consultant could offer a “safe” place --a transitional space-- for all to enter and to work together (in the hailstorm of ideas). Differences will always remain, but perhaps with agreement --no, commitment-- by all to accept differences AND to continue to work together within the expected chaos, to look inside as to which role(s) one is acting out, to both openly verbalize and listen to what is being expressed and felt (as we expect of ourselves and our patients within a treatment process) we might not only survive, but excel!!! I believe the poignant aspect of Eisold’s paper --the simple humanity of the analyst-- must be recognized, accepted and appreciated. Each and every one of us has a past; each and every one of us exists with wounds, with loneliness, with defenses, with defects, with compromises. We expect our patients to talk about them. Why not us?

Emmanuel Berman (2004), a training analyst in the Israeli Psychoanalytic Institute, in his book, IMPOSSIBLE TRAINING; A RELATIONAL VIEW OF PSYCHOANALYTIC TRAINING, views the strength of an institute as being related to its openness to allow change and, therefore, allow growth. He points out that growth occurs through dialogue, disagreements, expression of varying ideas, and, importantly, an increasingly clear idea of what should and needs to be discussed. There have been many analysts who have been thinking and writing about this way of approaching such problems that we face.

Let me conclude these comments by quoting Eisold:

The social defence of intolerance--which ultimately leads to splitting--is, in effect, the final common pathway in which defences against the contradictions of the analyst’s identity, the internal tensions of analytic institutions and marginality of psychoanalytic culture in relation to the world join together to proffer an illusory security of sectarian life. …It is, on the other hand, constantly threatened by the danger of closed boundaries under the pressures I have attempted to point out; in that sense, it is threatened--and, I think, knows itself to be threatened--by the dangers of becoming a collection of cults (p. 796).

Psychoanalysis and Campaign 2008

Rupture and Repair and the 2008 Presidential Campaign

Kim Vaz, Ph.D., Chair of the Womens Studies Dept. at the University of South Florida, and advanced candidate in psychoanalytic training at the Tampa Bay Institute for Psychoanalytic Studies, shared with me recently some interesting insights about the presidential campaign, and about one candidate in particular, Barack Obama.

Noting that our nation is in a crisis of identity, confronted by otherness, she sees parallels between Obama's stance and that of the analyst: If our nation is in a crisis, having to integrate the multiple selves/identities that are Americans--no longer the faceless of Montana or West Virginia--then Obama, Vaz says, asks us to look to him to "hold'' these "multiple identities that have fomented his imagination and his life of public service."

Obama tells us, as an analyst would, there will be 'ruptures.' And, like an analyst, Vaz notes, Obama tells us that though, 'not a perfect man, nor born of a perfect man, he will be, unlike his father, there, to listen, to learn, to lead, to fulfill promise.' "In other words," says Vaz, "there will be repair."

Vaz further notes that the 2008 campaign brings the "outsider identities of gender, age, and race" center stage. She expects, "We will need all our identities, foreign and U.S. born; male and female; old and young; black, white and brown, to solve the complex global problems America faces."

In Memorium

Remembering Charles Brenner, M.D.

It was with great sadness that I read of the death of Dr. Charles Brenner on Monday, May 19, 2008. Dr. Brenner was my first supervisor during my training at NYPI. He was gentlemanly and generous, and he modeled for me the interminable patience that psychoanalytic work requires.

He was, as a supervisor, neither didactic nor pedantic. Instead, he patiently listened to me week after week, year after year, describe to him my first control case. He saw within two weeks the analysand's developing erotic transference. But he did not push the point. He wanted me to grow to see what was in the analysand's material (just as the analysand must develop readiness to see), and it took me --for whatever reasons--six months. It was an invaluable lesson. By his example, I learned to wait with my patients.

And he was unflappable. He listened with great equanimity. With both of those traits as a guidepost I live daily in my consulting room. While more contemporary thought informs me today, Br. Brenner's example remains with me, the foundation for listening to the narrative. His memory is cherished by me, and he will be missed by many.

Tampa Bay Psychoanalytic Society Hosts Nancy Goodman, Ph.D.

On April 26, 2008, Nancy Goodman, Ph.D. spoke to the Tampa Bay Psychoanalytic Society about "Love that Hurts: When Sadomasochism Organizes the Psyche." What was clear is that Goodman experienced the analysand's detachment and silences as sadistic; she felt "tortured." What was not clear was why this was theorized as an anal fixation or even as an intent to treat the analyst sadistically. It is true that the analysand had early childhood experiences that centered around the alimentary canal (power struggles: 'forced' feedings and enemas), but the connection between these early experiences, the material, and the theory was not made clear.

What was truly refreshing was the subsequent discussion, and the presentor's graciousness regarding genuine openness to other perspectives. The attendees seemed to emphasize the early misattunement between mother and child. Mother's controlling and intrusive behavior may have led the small child, who later appears "autistic" as an adult analysand, to detach, not as a sadistic manuever to control the object, but as a self-preservation to contain unbearable affect (Lewis Aron, who, by the way, will visit Tampa October 17, 2008). Goodman herself recognized that a fetish (she proposed that the object-relationship was itself a fetish in this case) was an attempt to "keep away disorganizing terror." [I do acknowledge the defense of 'turning the tables,' (or as a colleague once cogently slipped, "What comes around, goes around"), that this analysand's behavior could communicate to and engender in the analyst the feelings he had felt as a child vis a vis his mother. But I wondered, as did others, what participation by the analyst helped entrench for so long this dynamic between them?]

The audience also noted that when a mother treats a baby not as a baby, but as an object, this may be indicative of the mother's inability to participate in reverie and to hold the baby in her mind (Thomas Ogden), a problem noted in the analysis: it was as if the analyst did not feel held in the analysand's mind and felt objectified. Detachment was also considered by some attendees, not as anally sadistic, but instead as anaclitic, a reaction of depression from an infant whose needs are so ignored, or misunderstood.

Goodman repeatedly evoked disavowal ("a desire to disavow difference") but did not explore that this disavowal may have been a co-creation, e.g. when an analyst can not allow certain topics or affects to be explored because of her own discomfort, a discomfort which the analysand implicitly perceives through tone, facial expression, body language, etc. (Goodman did evoke Wilfred Bion's concept ("alpha" function), but did not connect it to the material presented, nor to recent research on right brain communication and implicit knowing.)

Christopher Bollas, referring to Freud's early cases, speculated that the erotic transference may have been an attempt to enliven the analyst (out of the stance of abstinence). If indeed sadistic, could there not also have been in this presented case the additional possibility that an analysand uses sadistic behavior as an attempt to search for the surviving other (D.W.Winnicott; Jessica Benjamin), an attempt to break through to the other (analyst)? The turning point in the analysis was seen to be when the analyst spontaneously expressed "shock" that the analysand was quitting treatment. Could this have been pivotal, in part, because the analysand could now perceive an (affective) effect on the analyst?

On a more personal note: When a presentation allows for such lively, interesting, and fun discussion, I applaud the group's ability to sustain the tension between differing ideas. Perhaps the Tampa Bay Psychoanalytic Society possesses within it, after all, the ability to refrain from privileging one theoretical perspective as more refreshing than other equally evocative and useful ones. I also applaud Goodman's ability to be open to do so.

Online Interactive Series "Evolving Clinical Practice"

The Tampa Bay Institute for Psychoanalytic Studies Presents

Tradition and Change:
Evolving Clinical Practice

An interactive online series featuring a paper by
Arnold Schneider, Ph.D.

CLICK HERE to read paper "Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy"


How can psychoanalytic practitioners from diverse theoretical backgrounds
make use of new or different perspectives?

Dr. Arnold Schneider, an experienced psychoanalyst trained in the tradition of ego psychology, leads off this online series by inviting us to join him in his “work in progress.”

His engaging and insightful paper, written as an introductory presentation on psychoanalytic psychotherapy, highlights the basic phases and elements of the process using the lens of the traditional model that has formed the foundation of his practice. Only four years after writing it, Dr. Schneider takes the unusual and challenging step of using a forum like this to announce changes in his view of the analytic process. He welcomes us into a dialogue about possibilities for integrating contemporary approaches with traditional concepts and challenges us to think with him about what it means to evolve our psychoanalytic practice.

Interactive Online Series:

During the next several weeks,

responses of all kinds from various analytic therapists will be posted online.

We want to hear your thoughts about what additions, deletions, changes, etc. you'd make to the paper ---

all clinical and theoretical views welcome!

Make comments or share your experiences – anonymously or owned – simply by clicking on the “COMMENTS” link at the end of each post. At the conclusion, the faculty of TBIPS will offer a summary of the dialogue and compile an outline for a new "co-created" paper.

ADD YOUR THOUGHTS TO OUR PROJECT!

Click here to read "Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy" and then post your comments to help us integrate this ego-psychological paper with other contemporary approaches.

If Unconscious is in the Right Brain, why is analysis in the Left Brain?

There is something extremely puzzling to me. My hope is that, through discourse, I can come to better understand this question about analysis in the left brain (verbal, symbolization via language, logic-of sequence, explicit, etc) when growing evidence seats the Unconscious in the right brain (nonverbal, emotional-affective, bodily-based, relational, implicit). This 'crisis of faith' (really, of emphasis, or privileging of what is mutative) was triggered by my attendance at the American Psychological Association, Division 39 (psychoanalytic) over the weekend in NYC. Though I attended over 30 hours of presentations and discussions, I was most 'blown away' by the 50 minute lecture of Allan N. Schore, Ph.D. [of UCLA, author of "Affect Regulation and the Origin of the Self" and "Affect Regulation and the Reparation of the Self"] on April 12, 2008 entitled, "The Paradigm Shift: the Right Brain and the Relational Unconscious."

Schore is a neuropsychologist, so he talked about the brain. The most ancient part, the brainstem, oversees the automomic nervous system (think "automatic:" breathing and heart rate, fight-flight responses, etc), arousal, and pain. It interfaces with the limbic system (the seat of our emotions and libidinal and aggressive motivations), which, in turn, interfaces with the Right hemisphere. The right brain is bodily based, nonverbal, ultra-rapidly integrative of emotion, affect, facial expression, auditory prosodic, gestural, and other relational data, and is so rapid that this information processing is truly unconscious! It is the seat of implicit memory. In turn, the right brain interfaces with the left hemisphere, where explicit, verbal communication originates.

Early interactions between infant and caretaker regulate affect and self. The primary care-giver regulates the infant's bodily-based, affective arousal (the mind is not separate from the body). The infant brain actually develops according to relational, two-person, intersubjective experience! As most regulation is going on at the unconscious level, Schore recommends that analysis focus on recovery of affect-laden infantile experience, even dissociated affects.

As Schore states that 60% of communication is non-verbal (facial expression, posture, gestures, tone, prosody, pitch, inflection, etc), it makes one question how did psychoanalysis come to privilege left brain (explicit, verbal) communication? Because it is easier to quantify and understand consciously? [Some, including Lew Aron, who will visit us in Tampa October 17, 2008, and Jessica Benjamin theorize that the repudiation of feminity - designated as that which is relational and right brain, while language is designated masculine (think Lacan) - had something to do with the eschewing of right brain communication.]

I have to rethink how I will define psychoanalysis. Will my definition remain left brain lop-sided, privileging the revealing of the unconscious through reading between the (verbal) lines, or will I have to learn to value and make use of right brain communications? And am I doing that unconsciously already, unconscious to unconscious? Can this use of right brain unconscious even be taught or is it dependent on the infantile development of my own brain? Something besides insight from interpretation must be mutable, too, but how do we define it, learn it, understand it? Let me know what you think. I am grateful to Schore for giving me a basis to understand the clinical value of the elegant and painstaking research of Beebe and Lachmann on speech patterns and facial expression of the analyst. My children are grateful for any information that helps me pay more attention to tone.