Working Through The Four Discourses

Abstract

This article applies Jacques Lacan's four discourses to two memoirs, Love's Work and Paradiso, written by the British philosopher Gillian Rose during her treatment for cancer. It shows how Rose's evaluation and use of the different discourses parallels the trajectory of the psychoanalytic process as described by Lacan. First, Rose examines the discourses of the university and master and describes how they have positioned her in society. She then adopts the discourse of the hysteric in order to critique and demystify these positions. The analyst's discourse emerges in the action of writing the memoir itself. The empty page or screen veils and therefore evokes the object a, the cause of desire, instigating her revision of her own story. The analyst's discourse is particularly prevalent in the memoir form and provides a supplement to the novelistic “plot,” a supplement that emerges in the form of the creation of new master signifiers. Thus, in Rose's case, the product of the four discourses is the strategy of “love's work,” which prioritizes the effort of desire over perfect peace. The work of desire, which by definition addresses a flaw or lack, reconnects Rose to both her diseased body and the kernel of her desire that resists assimilation into the dominant discourse.