Death, mourning, and Co.

I surprised myself regularly reading the necrological notes of the newspaper to see if I was in there. The humour of this curiosity could be an introduction, as is customary, to the seriousness of the anecdote. It is effectively quite usual for the homage given at the foot of the grave to be the summit of hypocrisy, and most of all an illustration of our reticence in conceptualising mourning. The loss of the cherished object is the rather joyous condition of our access to life and opens up a dialogue with him that perpetuates (an admirable signifier) him for eternity. He was never so present (real) and eloquent (symbolic) as he is now. He only lacks the imaginary of a body for which we can thank him as if it were the sacrifice that is expected of him. Lacan must have said somewhere that mourning was only ever that of an object that one had been for he who has just died. Not therefore an occasion for the joyous shame that one has to conceal but rather egoistic abandon and sadness, on the fringes of melancholia. Bloody Lacan! We have never dialogued so much with him as since he his death and rendered more eloquent than when he was sitting in his armchair.

Ch. Melman

13 Sept. 21

Traduction faite par Michael Plastow