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Narcissus and Oedipus is an original, persuasive, provocative presentation, by Dr. Victoria Hamilton, of Kleinian concepts of object relationship and child development, which she anchors to her individual symbolization of the Greek myths of Narcissus and Oedipus Rex. Her interpretation of these myths is in a completely different universe from Freud's, which she uses as a point of departure. She attributes the adult tragedies in the myths to a miscarriage of child development, and additionally, in Oedipus Rex, to the emotional difficulties of the adoptive child, and to the vicissitudes of Oedipus' quest for knowledge of his identity. Dr. Hamilton supports her interpretation by a complex organization of information theory and philosophy, which she communicates in a lucid, engaging literary style. In support of her theories, she presents case vignettes from her psychoanalytic practice.
Dr. Hamilton, now in Los Angeles, is also engaged in the teaching of psychoanalysis. By her formal scholarship both in philosophy, as indicated by a doctorate from University College in London, and in psychoanalysis, in the Tavistock Clinic, and also by the depth of her creative reflection, she is well-equipped for the undertaking in the book. However, despite the largeness of her scope, she omits important contributions from neo-Freudianism which bear directly on her theme.
Part I of the book is devoted to the myth of Narcissus, for which Hamilton draws upon Freud's 1914 essay, “On Narcissism.” However, it is noteworthy that Freud actually makes bare reference to the myth itself, clearly taking it for granted that his readers are familiar with it and agree with his quite conventional interpretation that it symbolizes the penalty for the narcissistic impossibility of loving another because of absorption in self-love. In contrast to his shaping of the Oedipus complex, Freud does not offer any reflections on what might have been in Narcissus' “Unconscious” or in that of any other of the rela