Метастази насолоди. Шість нарисів про жінку і причинність

by Slavoj Žižek, Славой Жижек

Книга відомого словенського психоаналітика присвячена проблемам психоаналізу кінця 20 віку, зокрема неперервності психоаналітичної традиції від З. Фройда до Ж. Лакана.

Genres: Philosophy, Psychoanalysis, Theory, Nonfiction, Feminism, Essays, 20th Century

188 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Slavoj Žižek is a Slovene sociologist, philosopher, and cultural critic.

He was born in Ljubljana, Slovenia (then part of SFR Yugoslavia). He received a Doctor of Arts in Philosophy from the University of Ljubljana and studied psychoanalysis at the University of Paris VIII with Jacques-Alain Miller and François Regnault. In 1990 he was a candidate with the party Liberal Democracy of Slovenia for Presidency of the Republic of Slovenia (an auxiliary institution, abolished in 1992).

Since 2005, Žižek has been a member of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

Žižek is well known for his use of the works of 20th century French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan in a new reading of popular culture. He writes on many topics including the Iraq War, fundamentalism, capitalism, tolerance, political correctness, globalization, subjectivity, human rights, Lenin, myth, cyberspace, postmodernism, multiculturalism, post-marxism, David Lynch, and Alfred Hitchcock.

In an interview with the Spanish newspaper El País he jokingly described himself as an "orthodox Lacanian Stalinist". In an interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now! he described himself as a "Marxist" and a "Communist."

Reviews

[Nuno R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyment and its excessive nature, according to Lacan according to Zizek. Courtly love, that I resisted and resisted and still have not understood. Will not write here pretending to be anywhere near an expert, or even someone that can write a few lines about Zizek without a sense of embarrassment. It's an author that makes me grow, as a thinker; that makes me want to be smarter and read more. Sometimes, reading him is like a sort of intelectual poetry. And saying this is dumb, I know. Whenever I detect that I am not following what he says, I stop. Reading Zizek is, always, an exercise of self discipline.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

The most dizzying thing I took away from this book was the way our culture tries to force us to enjoy things, as if that is all there ever is, and if you are not in a constant mood of happiness and entertainment, then there is something wrong with you. This method of looking at enjoyment as a disease, one which we are constantly seeing and never able to reach, therefore causing all of us to feel that there is something wrong, is a lense I think about everytime I work the concession stand at the movie theater. I never want to tell someone to "Enjoy" again, because that is not a command!

[Benjamin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The format is typical Zizek. 6 essays with some sort of thread between them, split into parts by theme and all quixotically hinged upon some sort of premise which is explained in the introduction. However, this one actually does what Zizek says it does. He does actually look at the topic he outlines. In this book Zizek explores the Lacanian concept of jouissance that he feels lies at the heart of ideology (nothing new there) but following through the notion of the cause as a political factor. This brings him onto the second division on women which draws us back to jouissance again.

This manages to be both old hat (if you've read him before) but refreshingly new. There's fewer meaningless delves into pop culture and some actual explanations of what Lacan means rather than expectations that we already know. Some of his chapters on women seem to be attempting to move beyond categories of phallocetric psychoanalysis without really managing it. There are better writers on female sexuality out there. However, his writing on Lynch is impeccable and there are some great reflections on desire which are worth reading.

There's also a self-interview in the appendix which is best read before you begin. Much of it seems to be a repetition of what is already discussed earlier but in less depth. It almost serves as a Rough Guide to Zizek which might make entry into his work easier (if you get some of the references already, as it really just irons out the idiosyncrasies in his readings rather than explaining the concepts he starts with). If you read it after the main body of the book then it is a little tedious.

[Milena · Rating 3 out of 5]

That one time kada je neko konačno objasnio deo univerzuma Dejvida Linča kako dolikuje

[Danica]

read the first chapter, had a beer, and tried to get my therapist to tell me what kind of psychoanalysis he could stand behind.

[Anita]

I'm still trying to work out whether Zizek really takes women as subjects into account...

[Max Nemtsov · Rating 4 out of 5]

А теперь все вместе: Жижек in the sky with diamonds… Книжка, если разобраться, по сути посвящена гениальной фразе из фильма «Телохранитель»: «От этого невозможно отвести взгляд, как от зрелища железнодорожной катастрофы». Я бета-читал русский перевод (Шаши), о котором дальше будет больше, но не могу утверждать, что так-таки все в ней понял и уж тем паче разделил. Вообще рассуждения по принципу Барроуза «Take a word — any word» видятся мне непостигаемыми из принципа, разве что осмосом (см. поливы одного из первых трепачей и едва и не самого знаменитого до сих пор, в частности, про горчичное зернышко; так и тут — назовем его, мнэ, ну, скажем, Полуэкт). Если и было что полезное в этом моем экзерсисе — Жижек напомнил о том, как можно смотреть кино (комплексно-аналитически, если не скучно; это такой отчасти детский способ, как ни странно, о котором мы часто забываем, по-взрослому увлекаясь, например, сюжетом или работой осветителя). Рискую навлечь на себя презрение тех, кто уверен, что до конца понимает, о чем Жижек все время бормочет, а главное — зачем он это делает.
Ну и да — это та книжка, где фигурирует, как выяснилось по ходу изысканий, легендарный вброс о дружбе Жана Лафитта и Карла Маркса (интересующихся мы пошлем, пожалуй, в Гугл). Поскольку фигурирует он в эпилоге, написанном в кокетливом и вертлявом жанре «интервью с самим собой» («Приятно поговорить с умным человеком, — как бы говорит нам автор, — не то что с вами, немытыми массами»), вброс этот служит, я подозреваю, исключительно для проверки à la Myles: по-прежнему ли внимательно вы все это читаете и дочитали ли до сюда? Других версий у меня нет.

[DoctorM · Rating 3 out of 5]

One never quite knows what to make of Zizek. My friend Ginny at McGill recommended this, and, while I enjoyed it, I'd forgotten how Zizek writes--- that strange inability to decide whether he's a Lacanian or a kind of repentant Marxist... The two chapters here on Courtly Love and David Lynch are very much worth reading--- Zizek does deft takes on "The Crying Game", Cronenberg's "M. Butterfly", and Lynch's "Wild At Heart". Yet there's a sense that the opening, more theoretical chapters are just window dressing...and a nagging sense that Zizek just might see women (or Woman) as the lamia-figure some feminists have accused Lacan of portraying. Anyway--- Zizek is an acquired taste, though one without the wildness of Lacan himself. Read it for the Courtly Love essay and the take on Lynch. Just...be suspicious.

[M. · Rating 2 out of 5]

Essays 3, 4 and 6 were good, then a few elements of the other content, but too much Lacanian mumbo jumbo, Marxist-Zizekian dodging and oh, boy, will he ever write in an intelligble way? I'm not sure I want to find out. Throughoutly depressing with the occasional good point.

Bonuses:I found out that Weniger and Hegel are misognyists.

[Anna Chiaretta · Rating 5 out of 5]

contains a good essay on David Lynch's films and their expressions of primordial desires as well as feminine identity issues described in reference to (of course) Lacan's 'objet petit a.'

[Gwiezdzisteniebo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Trochę bardziej chaotyczna niż "Patrząc z ukosa". Momentami człowiek gubi się w tym, co należy uznać za prywatną teorię Zizka, co za faktycznie wyrażony pogląd Lacana, a co jest tylko luźnym przemyśleniem, wysnutym z interpretacji filmu.

[Abraham Lewik · Rating 3 out of 5]

Free e-copy available on-line, how things should be.

I read this and The Return of the Soldier in one day. This is the more wild of the two.

[Lauris Veips · Rating 5 out of 5]

tour de fucking force

[OscarBeardsley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read a few thing by Zizek already but I don't think I fully understood these essays, or why he wrote them.
They seem a bit random and end with no conclusion or point.

[Amar · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid from Zizek. Particularly good were his points relating to Bosnia & liberal democracy.

[Hanna Nvp · Rating 2 out of 5]

lite för svår för mig

[Marianne · Rating 3 out of 5]

only read the last three essays and the self-interview

[Jodie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting read - problematic at moments yet overall a fascinating exploration of Lacans Jouissance. Would need to read more into Otto Weiningers approach to eradicate suspicion..

Wait I need to update this because it’s actually so interesting I have been dwelingggggg

[Jacob · Rating 5 out of 5]

Contains some of his very best reflections on the Yugoslavian Wars.

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of Zizek's more coherent books. Many of the arguments in the essays here have since been taken up at monograph length by other lacanian writers, and so this work reads kind of like a survey of the field. I'm thinking specifically of Rothenberg's "Excessive Subject" as a full length treatment of the second essay, "Does the Subject have a Cause?" and Copjec's "Imagine There's No Woman" as a discussion of many of the topics that come up here. I particularly enjoyed Zizek's distinction between the evil of the Superego and the evil of the id, as well as the first essay on the distinction between Adorno, Habermas and Fromm and their respective appropriations of psychoanalysis.

A minor quibble: I don't buy Zizek's analysis of Dangerous Liasons as a kind of courtly love relationship in which Valmont relates to the Marquise de Merteuil as a Freudian "Das Ding." Zizek ignores the fact that the Marquise is forced to sacrifice her lover, just as Valmont is. This would never have happened with Dante and Beatrice, for example. The pact between the two is far too much a pact of equals for Zizek's analysis to work. Zupancic's take on the Valmont/Merteuil relationship in Ethics of the Real is far more insightful.

[Cary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Maybe my third favorite of the seven Zizek I've read. Like many have said before, about three of the essays in here are indelible (my picks are the one on Althusser, Courtly Love, and the one on David Lynch and "feminine depression." This confirms for me that Zizek, much like indie rock, was a whole lot better in the '90s.

[George · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not as accessible or as entertaining as his "Pervert's Guide To The Cinema," but his language lives to drift off into gorgeous and esoteric research-informed speculative certainties that are fun to project into the art forms and depiction of women that are his launching points.

[Emelinemimie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zižek is enjoyable and fun to read as usual, his use of popular culture making him very accessible. My main issue was that the link between the different articles and the main title was tenuous, and I did not really get what I expected out of it.

[Shashi Martynova · Rating 4 out of 5]

http://dodo-space.ru/lobster/2016-08-20/

[Melusine Parry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tough at times and for some essays you need much more background than I have. But it's still a very enjoyable and stimulating read. I have major problems with his essays on women.

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very accessible Zizek text.

[Ross]

have bought, may comment later...