Death and Delusion: A Freudian Analysis of Moral Terror

290 Pages·2000·15.98 MB·English

by  Jerry S. Piven

Death and Delusion:
A Freudian Analysis of
Mortal Terror
by
J. S. Piven
New School University
~,
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Death and Delusion:
A Freudian Analysis of
Mortal Terror
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Piven, Jerry S.
Death and delusion: a Freudian analysis of mortal terror I by J.S.
Piven.
p.cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ).
ISBN 1-59311-124-X (pbk.) - ISBN 1-59311-249-1 (hardcover)
1. Freud, Sigmund, 1856-1939.2. Death-Psychological aspects. 3.
Anxiety. I. Title.
BF789.D4P582004
155.9'37-dc22
2004004346
Copyright © 2004 Information Age Publishing Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, microfilming, recording or otherwise, without written permission
from the publisher.
Printed in the United States of America
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction I
1. Death, Disavowal, and Fantasy 21
2. Death, Repression, Narcissism, and Misogyny 49
3. Super-Ego, Submission, and Death 81
4. Birth, Death, Dread, and Religion 103
5. Death and the Wolf Man 125
6. Transience, Mourning, and the Fear of Death 141
7. Pleasure and Death 153
8. Death, Neurosis, Normalcy, and Massacre 187
9. Conclusions 219
Addendum: On Experimental Studies in Terror Management 237
References 245
Index 271
v
To K. R. Eissler and Norman Brown, without whose unceasing support and
dialogue for over a decade I could not have undertaken this assay.
To my parents, without whom I would have never turned to Freud.
To Mimi, love of my life.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to express my appreciation and sincere gratitude to Drs. Shel
don Solomon, David L. Miller, and Ernest Wallwork for their wisdom,
tireless efforts, and enduring patience. lowe as many thanks to Drs.
J ames Wiggins and John Crowley, who honored me by reading this work
and offering suggestions while it was in its initial stages. I would also like
to show appreciation to my friends Dr. Dan Liechty for years of profound
discussion, Dr. Ronald Leifer for numerous ideas which transcend indoc
trinated psychology, and Dr. Marvin Hurvich for his excellent suggestions
and assistance in my research. I would like to thank especially Dr. Alan
Barnett, my professor at the National Psychological Association for Psy
choanalysis, who pored over my manuscript with Talmudic care and atten
tion. I would like to acknowledge the magnanimity of Guilford Press for
providing permission to reprint Death, Repression, Narcissism, and Misogyny,
which appeared in The Psychoanalytic Review, 90(2), April 2003; Interna
tional Universities Press, for permitting me to reprint Birth, Death, Dread,
Religion in Psychoanalysis and Contemporary Thought, 26(3), August 2003;
and Oxford University Press for allowing me to republish Death, Neurosis,
and Normalcy, which appeared in the Journal oft he American Academy ofR eli
gion, 71(1), March 2003.
J.
S. Piven
vii

Why, what is pomp, rule, reign, but earth and dust?
And live how we can, yet die we must.
-Henry VI, Part Three, V; ii, 27 (1591)
Is there any meaning in my life that will not be
destroyed by my inevitably approaching death?
-Tolstoy, Confession (1879)