So What—Reflections on Mitchell Wilson's The Analyst's Desire: The Ethical Foundation of Clinical Practice By Mitchell Wilson  Bloomsbury Academic, 2020,  264 pages, $35.95

Let's begin with that iconic scene from Taxi Driver (1976). Travis Bickle (Robert De Niro) is addressing himself in a mirror. Armed and eager, Bickle is on a mission. He is about to vanquish the man who has taken his prized woman. He practices. Five quick takes, each a variation of the others:

Bickle, spoken to and therefore insulted by the audacity of his lowlife opponent, instantly retaliates, rapidly drawing his pistol and firing it at the image in the mirror. Each take ends in the same moment of smug satisfaction: pow, pow, pow, pow, pow. Bickle knows exactly what to do. He finds the object he's looking for; he takes care of business. No delay, no wishing, none of Freud's “bitter experience.” For Bickle in front of the mirror, here it is, all at once; the gift of full immediacy, of perfect satisfaction.

Bickle has long ago lost control of himself; destiny has taken over. He practices in front of the mirror—playing both parts of what must come when he meets the real thing.

Let's now strip Bickle of his weapons, deprive him of his mirror, dilute his memory. Let's leave him unhappy and uncertain, but now neither knowing what bothers him nor what to do about it. His revenge narrative has lost none of its power but has become a barely perceptible shadow. Bickle no longer knows his own story.