Rather than take up the habitual objections to Kleinian and object relations theorists' conceptions of the Oedipus complex, a discussion is presented of two current ‘models’: the Anti-Oedipus and the American relational perspective. Considered as utopias (the utopia of limitless, unconstrained pleasure and the egalitarian utopia), these ‘models’, which apparently stand opposed, are shown to be sustained by a common underlying fantasy, that of a psyche without structure or organization. A relationship is established between the birth of the psychic apparatus and the oedipal configuration which can also be found in the classical analytic situation as well as in the biblical myth of Genesis.