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Bela Grunberger's importance as a theorist of narcissism was first made evident to English-speaking audiences with the publication of Narcissism, Psychoanalytic Essays (International Universities Press) in 1979. With the publication of this further series of essays, the potency of Grunberger's critique of narcissism becomes more apparent, as
do some of its underlying ideological constraints. Despite the unwieldy literary nature of the book, produced by the repetitive outlining of Grunberger's basic theory in almost every essay, this is a collection of considerable importance. Narcissism has become emblematic of a certain way of being under conditions of modernity; in some instances, as in the work of Christopher Lasch, it has become a characterisation of contemporary consumer society as a whole. In this book, Grunberger offers the most trenchant available psychoanalytic critique of the regressive nature of pure narcissism and thus, both directly and indirectly, demonstrates the dangers of a culture that produces narcissism as a common structure of personality.
Grunberger's book has a number of important threads, including an intriguing analysis of antisemitism, an oppositional stance towards Lacan which nevertheless powerfully employs some Lacanian concepts, and an account of the relationships between ego ideal and super-ego linked closely to the work of Grunberger's collaborator Chasseguet-Smirgel. In this review, however, I am going to focus on the central elements of Grunberger's theory of the origins and nature of narcissism and the sense in which he regards it as a regressive phenomenon. It is this aspect of his work which is most in need of wider dissemination and appraisal.
Grunberger locates the origins of narcissism in the prenatal state of the foetus, which he refers to as ‘prenatal coenesthesis’ - a perfect state of holistic completeness. This state is the source of all the sensations of regressive narcissism, sensations which derive their powerful positi