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The intrinsic link between the notion of thirdness and the different dimensions of time – a link that finds its expression in the notion of the uncanny – can be seen in a clinical sequence presented by Christian Delourmel to the 2012 Congrès de Langue Française in Paris. Furthermore, this clinical sequence enables me to suggest that a new paradigm is being constructed in psychoanalytic theory in France.
The clinical example presented by Delourmel was of the analysis of a woman. I shall give a summarized account of this complex clinical material, as I wish to concentrate on only one aspect of it. It is relevant to note that this analysis took place in French.
The analyst found it difficult at the outset to have a clear account of the patient’s history and childhood. The picture that emerged was of a rejecting mother and an alcoholic father, incestuous and paedophilic, who touched the patient and her brothers sexually. In the analysis, the patient developed a passionate transference to her analyst, but he felt that she was, nevertheless, accessible to his interpretations. The patient had had two previous analyses, and Delourmel let us know that he used the resonance of the name of the previous analysts in his interpretations. For instance, he would indicate the homophonic link between the name of her first analyst, Cassin, and the way she mentioned the rupture of that treatment “I broke down” (je me suis cassée) by the end of the second year of analysis, as well as the idealization of her second analyst by associating his name, Tréhot, with “very high” (très haut).
Delourmel also used aspects of his own name, and we see more of that in what follows. He states that the patient accepted these types
of associative interpretations but could not withstand those interpretations that referred to the oedipal layer – for instance, in relation to her rivalry with other patients or even with the analyst.
The first types of interventions, the analyst tells us, took place in a trans