Archives par mot-clé : Epistemophilic drive

Domininque Agostini : Melanie Klein as an analyst of adolescents : v. some conclusions

This text brings to a close the series of articles « Melanie Klein as an analyst of adolesents ». In the course of this series, the author has successively studied the cases of four adolescents. Three were Klein’s patients: « Felix», « Ilse», and « Willy» illustrated the concepts of internal objects, unconscious fantasies, and the feminine phase common to both sexes. The fourth, « Fabien Especel », was the hero of a fantastic novel whose projective identifications Klein explored.
As part of this conclusion, the author revisits the Kleinian conception of the childhood roots of « psychical puberty » and the theory behind the technique used with adolescents. In doing this, he describes certain new ideas which, sown by the thinking of Klein, came to fruition after her death. In particular, new ways of thinking about the transference/counter-transference pair, through explorations of the epistemophilic drive and projective identification.