Silence and Verbalization: A Supplement to the Theory of the 'Analytic Rule'

The present study is devoted to the proposition that the physical act of speaking—to be considered here as a phase of and distinguished from the whole of 'verbalization'—may precipitate the release of quanta of regressive affect collateral to repressed ideation, and that such release is amongst the causes of the failure of the maintenance of repression. The conclusion drawn from this proposition is that the pleasure-physiological function of speaking is therapeutically active, and that, since liberation of affect is dependent upon instinctual discharge, a theory of the 'analytic rule' must account for its 'erotogenic' effects. If it is true that repression can be successful only as long as the affect collateral to the repressed ideation is suppressed—or that, as Freud expressed it, the 'vicissitudes of the affect-quantum of the representation' (in contrast to those of the ideational content) are 'decisive for the evaluation of the success of the repression'—the influence wrought upon repression through direct release of regressive affect in consequence of the pleasure-physiological functioning of the speech-apparatus requires serious consideration. Since the other influences of verbalization upon repression—such as are inherent in the formation of derivatives of repressed unconscious ideation, in the communication of these derivatives to the object of a transference, in the expression of affective experiences in the process of free association, etc.—have been described exhaustively, it is in order to subject the one remaining influence to a selective investigation.

The earliest analytic description of speaking per se, as a means of discharging affect we owe to Karl Abraham, who, in his Contributions of Oral Erotism to Character Formation, writes: '… The craving of certain individuals to experience gratification by way of sucking has changed to a need to give by way of the mouth, so that we find in them, besides the constant wish to obtain everything, a perpetual