Anaïs Nin and the Developmental Use of the Creative Process

Can the creative process be used to mourn? Can it be used to undergo a developmental form of mourning that not only involves the relinquishing of a lost object, but also separating from the object through self and other differentiation and its accompanying aspects of self-integration? The following case of a distinguished woman writer will be used to illustrate how the creative process can be used to mourn and individuate.

Anaïs Nin demonstrates the resolution of a narcissistic neurosis, where narcissistic conflicts are experienced at a phallic and oedipal level of development, despite whatever contributions to such pathology may have resulted from preoedipal maternal-related trauma (see Kavaler, 1986, 1988, for contrasting illustrations of preoedipal cases). The narcissistic desires are combined with oedipal erotic yearnings, and are focused on the figure of an internal father, lost as an external object through paternal abandonment. The father is desired as an idealized extension of a young girl's self, with phallic omnipotent connotations, and these narcissistic strivings are converted into cravings for an omnipotent male mirroring presence. The manifest subjective strivings are then for an adoring mirroring reflection from the masculine other who becomes a derivative of the early phallic and oedipal period father.

This case will be used to demonstrate how traumatic loss of a father can interfere with the potential maturational resolution of such narcissistic yearnings that become focused on the father. Also, the specific mode of paternal pathology, specifically narcissistic pathology in this case, will be seen as interacting with such loss in disrupting the developmental resolution of a woman's self-differentiation and individuation process.