Psychoanalytic reading through the theory of the four discourses

Abstract

Literature and psychoanalysis have always been living in a kind of symbiosis, at the same time complementing and excluding each other. The subject was first taken up by Freud and while tradition was faithfully continued, Jacques Lacan stands out from the crowd. His theory of the four discourses is a useful tool for psychoanalysis' implications regarding literature and through it we can posit four different types of readers, each of whom deals with works of literature uniquely. ‘Master’ reader reads everything alike, ‘hysteric’ tries to find a key in the text, ‘universalist’ reads objectively and ‘analyst’ reads symptomatically. Instead of reducing the relation between literature and psychoanalysis to mere application, we should strive to recognize the meaning of transference in reading whilst not forgetting about the paradox in which we find ourselves as readers: as masters and apprentices. And above all as subjects of desire.