Guédeney compares rhetorical figures of speech (e.g., metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche) with displacement, condensation, and representability. She feels that the latter bear witness to the functioning of the psychic apparatus just as the figures bear witness to the existence of language. There is no discourse without these figures of speech, just as there is no mental activity without condensation, displacement, etc. The unconscious structures language and constitutes it. From language comes syntax, the notion of time, contradiction, and difference. These tropes are not created ex nihilo, but result from the work of the unconscious and show the abilities of the unconscious thought processes. All the tropes have a symbolic value and permit one to hear something other than what is said. She