Someone inadvertently reminded me today that I used to refer to my PhD as Humbert Humbert refers to his story in Lolita. I always wanted to say to my examination panel, while pointing at my voluminous thesis and looking at my seductive artworks:
Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, look at this tangle of thorns.
A tangle of thorns it feels as I go beyond merely toying with ideas to starting building a framework, or something along those linesĶ Conversations help. I never realised how much of a PhD is actually sparked by other people. My acknowledgements list grows and grows; I am a grateful person and want everyone meaningful to be represented. Remainders of a Catholic upbringing, no doubt. As SÄìÄì says, why lead astray from right behaviour? What is right behaviour? Right behaviour according to whom? Morals, values and ethics (together with phantasies and desires) are back into the equation and I hope ForresterÄôs chapter ÄúRape, Seduction and PsychoanalysisÄù holds some pointers for me. Or maybe I will find what I am looking for in casual conversations. I joined a psychoanalysis message board on LJ but seem to be merely talking to myself thereĶ The tangle is getting more and more knotted, the thorns start to pierce.
[...] Little by little, I am beginning to see the knots in my tangle of thorns. Apart from Object a, the discourse of the analyst and transference, I know suspect the feminine and jouissance also have something to do with all of this. I have been putting off reading Seminar XX, but Parveen Adams’s article on Mary Kelly and Ellie Ragland’s text (How the fact that there’s no sexual relation gives rise to culture ”1” ) together with the objects I am making (reminiscent of jewellery and of being looked at… Soon, I will post pictures) is pointing in the direction of unequivocal feminine pleasures. Feminine but not feminist, although this is a new knot I will have to sit down and undo. [...]