11 ..16
P.S.: I have no objections to publishing this correspondence in Arché, as long as you authorise me to publish it in Scibbolet 5 under the rubric of Spaziozero. But I would publish it with a few cuts, only to maintain the imprint of the contingency, which is always welcome in analysis, as it is the mark of the phallus.
P.P.S.: Perhaps you are not aware that the one who is writing to you is an exemplary – in Italy perhaps more unique than rare – of those poor souls who, living under Lacan, took the passe with the then renowned EFP (I mean, before the dissolution). A failure amongst many, as this event was carried out entirely under the heading of identification with the symptom of Lacan, who, through the passe, asked nothing else from the world than the improper recognition of his teaching. I was forced by Lacan himself to attempt the enterprise (it might have been the lethal outcome of this that lead me not to institute a passe in my association).
This long preamble is to introduce the question that, by surprise, a regularly randomly selected passeur asked me at the end the passe: ‘By what may an analyst be recognised?’ At that time, frazzled as I was by the interweaving of various and not very homogeneous transferences – on the analyst, on the passeur, on the master – I was unable to answer. This was so, not because I lacked a precise reply, but because I still lacked the moral courage to offer one that was my own. Twenty years later, I have granted myself that courage, building it piece by piece. Today I would say that an analyst could be recognised by the fact that he attempts the impossible. As with all good tests, this condition is obviously necessary but not sufficient: I know good philosophers who attempt the impossible, but they are not analysts. Needless to say, I am happy to work with them. Doubly needless to say, amongst them, one could not find a single psychotherapist, even if one paid in gold.
(1) Original text: ‘benessere’. In Italian, ‘Societá del benessere’ means ‘a healthy-and-wealthy society’.
(2) In relation to this, see Franco Baldini’s reply.
(3) Institute for Permanent Theoretical Formation.
From Perrella to Sciacchitano
Padua, 24th September 1997
Dear Antonello,
I totally agree with you that our correspondence has not ended yet, although I do think that we are finding ourselves on less and less distant positions. Naturally, I have nothing against publishing our letter in Scibbolet too, although this raises only a little doubt for me: why publish the same text more than once? Would it not be precisely because the readers of one journal do not read the others? And is this separation (everyone for himself and no one for all) not one of the problems that Spaziozero should resolve? What I am saying is this: would it not be better if the readers of Scibbolet also read Arché, and if the readers of Arché also read Scibbolet? In any case, we shall do as you wish. Could you let me have an edited copy of your letters? I shall let you have one of mine, too, and then we can put them together. If the correspondence continues beyond its publication, we should continue to publish it as a series – like a romance of the eighteen hundreds…