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The struggle for dominance discussed in Chapter 5 may lead to an important form of psychic retreat based on resentment and grievance. This type of outcome is illustrated in the present chapter. Here I try to show how resentments can build up and be nursed when the impulse to violence and in particular revenge is prevented from being expressed. The resentment leads to an impasse from which it is difficult for the analyst and patient to extricate themselves. A clinical example illustrating such an impasse is discussed. Extracts from Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson are then used to illustrate ways in which resentment can sometimes be relinquished and replaced with forgiveness.
There has been a great deal of interest recently in the problem of resentment and grievance. In considering the way grievance is maintained and the defensive reasons for its persistence, we have come to understand how it can appear to be held on to at all costs and how the analyst may be experienced as a threat, trying to take something precious away from the patient. An addictive quality and perverse gratification often adds to the hold that grievance has on the personality. At the same time the patient comes to fear that giving up his grievance would lead to collapse and catastrophe, and it seems to provide a sense of integration and protection from breakdown (Feldman, 2008, 2009). A related view of grievance comes from the work of Spillius (1993), who described what she called impenitent envy — that is, envy leading to hatred that is felt to be justified and does not lead to regret or guilt. She links this type of envy to grievance, which also has this impenitent quality.
My own concern has been to try to look at the relationship between resentment and the wish for revenge that arises when the patient feels injured and wronged. My contention is that when such injuries are felt to be unfair, they give rise to a wish for revenge that is accompanied by extreme hatred and destructiveness. Be