Critique of Psychoanalytic Reason

The highly arcane "wisdom" produced by the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan is either endlessly regurgitated and recited as holy writ by his numerous acolytes, or radically dismissed as unpalatable nonsense by his equally countless detractors. Contrary to these common, strictly antagonistic yet uniformly uncritical practices, this book offers a meticulous critique of some key theoretical and clinical aspects of Lacan¿s expansive oeuvre, testing their consistency, examining their implications, and investigating their significance.

In nine interrelated chapters, the book highlights both the flaws and the strengths of Lacan¿s ideas, in areas of investigation that are as crucial as they are contentious, within as well as outside psychoanalysis. Drawing on a vast range of source materials, including many unpublished archival documents, it teases out controversial issues such as money, organisational failure, and lighthearted, "gay" thinking, and it relies on the highest stan