Examen corrigé Université de Montréal Thèse numérique Papyrus ...

79traumatic event that is always already missed. The missed eventsbe they related to subjectivityor hermeneuticsdefine the circuits of the Lacanian jouissance. In this sense, the scarlet letter Ais a Lacanian Thingas Ding. It is the materialization of the impossible jouissance. If the scarletletter were to arrive at its destination, the impossible jouissance would be lost. A central question,of course, is whether it does arrive, and what would constitute such arrival. Certainly, as weknow, the letter never closes in on a particular signified; it merely keeps turning in the spiral ofdifférance. That, however, is not to say that it does not arrive at its destination (because the letteralways does arrive in one way or another, as Lacan points out). The arrival of the letter, like itshermeneutic deciphering, registers the letter in the uncertain space of différance. It follows, then,that to assign a monolithic meaning to the letter A, which is but a dissolution of hermeneutics,would be followed by psychoanalytic cure which is but the eventual dissolution of transference.This spiral transference means that the relationship between the analyst and the analysand isparanoid. Having said that, I do not, however, wish to study the work of transference, since theavailable tools (tropes) are, as it were, similar to the work of transference; I would like rather tocomprehend the investment of transference in jouissance.The analysand fears the loss of his kernel of jouissance and the subject does not abandonhis symptom after the psychoanalytic cure. This pathological dependence on the symptom leadsto the creation of what Lacan calls “Sinthome.” 23 According to Žižek, the sinthome is a “terrifyingbodily mark which is merely a mute attestation bearing witness to a disgusting enjoyment,without representing anything or anyone” (76). Indeed, the sinthome is more immediately thesymptom that is beyond reading, interpretation, or “healing,” hence the injunction to enjoy thesymptom. Also, the sinthome is that meaningless ritual, gesture, or mark that gives a precarious