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NarcissusandNarcissisminEarlyPsychoanalysis…
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thesemioticborderisrepresentedbythesumofbilingualtranslatable
“filters,”passingthroughwhichthetextistranslatedintoanotherlan-
guage(orlanguages),situatedoutsidethegivensemiosphere.the
borderpointsofthesemiospheremaybelikenedtosensoryreceptors,
whichtransferexternalstimuliintothelanguageofournervoussystem,
oraunitoftranslation,whichadaptstheexternalactortoagivensemi-
oticsphere.5
Teborderisalso,andinvirtueofbeingaborder,azoneofincreasedsemiotic
activity.Teamountoftranslationsunderwayattheborderacceleratessemiotic
processes.6
Now,giventhesetheoreticalpreliminaries,Iwillarguethattheevolution
oftheconceptofnarcissismcanbeunderstoodintermsofathree-partdia-
loguebetweenpsychologicalobservations(clinicalandothers),psychologi-
caltheoryandliterature.Teintersectionbetweenliteratureandpsychological
observationcanbeconceivedasaborder,inLotman)ssense,betweentwosemi-
oticspheres.Aspsychiatrybringsacertaindomainofpsychologicalphenomena
intothevicinityoftheNarcissustheme,borderpointsareconstituted,through
whichsemioticelementsfromonespherearetranslatedintotheother.Tis
borderzonethenbringsaboutanacceleratedsemioticactivityattheperiph-
eryandaconflictemergesbetweencentreandperiphery,whereinfluencesfrom
theborderthreatenthehierarchicalorganizationofthesemiosphereestablished
atthecentre.Gradually,then,narcissismisformulatedatthecoreofthesub-
semiosphereknownaspsychoanalysis.Asaregulatinghigher-ordermodeling
system,thetheoryofinstincts,wherenarcissismissubsequentlyintroduced,
controlsthehierarchicalorganizationofthelanguagesofpsychoanalysis.Te
acceleratedsemioticactivityattheborderwiththeNarcissustheme,however,is
reproducedthroughthesemioticsphereandforcesarevisionofthetheoryof
instinctsandothercentralmodelingsystems,culminatinginthemetapsychol-
ogyofthemid-1910s.
ToillustratetheprocessIhavebeensketching,Iwillnowtakealookat
fourdińerentpointsinthisevolution,intextsbyHavelockEllis,OttoRankand
Freud.
Tefirstpointiswhentheconceptisfirstintroduced.Teterm“narcis-
sism”wasfirstusedbyPaulNäckeinanarticlein1899.7Tisistobeconsid-
ered,however,asameretranslationofwhatEllistheyearbeforehadreferred
toasa“Narcissus-liketendency.”IwillthereforeturntoEllis)sarticle,inthe
extendedshapeittookinthethirdeditionofthefirstvolumeofhisStudiesin
5Lotman,“OntheSemiosphere,”208-9.
6Ibid.,212.
7PaulNäcke,“KritischeszumKapiteldernormalenundpathologischenSexualität,”Archiv
fürPsychiatrie13(1899):356-86,375.