Medea

Our unconscious fantasies can be embedded in the old-age myths. This book takes Euripides tragedy of Medea as its starting point. Many modern films and plays about Medea reflect our ever-present interest in the myths. The Danish film director T.H. Dreyer had plans to realise a film on story of Medea, while his countryman Lars von Trier made his own version of Medea, based on Dreyer's previous work on the theme. In this remarkable new book the 'Medea fantasy is introduced as an unconscious determinant of psychogenic sterility, a fantasy that may form an unrecognized and dissociated part of the self-representation leading women to believe that their lovers (like Jason in the original myth) will deceive and abandon them, and that this anxiety might cause them to react violently towards their children. For such women it is imperative to forgo any creative femininity. Also examined in this book is a particular type of female masochism that has a strong influence on the life of couples, often destroying the possibility of genuine mutuality between the spouses. The masochistic element can be manifested in the way the woman abandons her own world and possibilities of creativity in order to immerse herself in the partners world. The areas covered in the book also include pregnancy, abortion, maternal ambivalence, loving and hating the baby, shame, ideals and idealisation of motherhood. The book also explores such issues such as sister fantasy, sisterly and lesbian love, the problems between mother and daughter, and the female destructiveness as reflected in fairy-tales. Lastly, the purpose of human life being understood as the search for happiness, it studies what factors might lead to happy and satisfactory relationships and what factors may lead to failure in establishing such lasting and mutually beneficial relationships in life. These carefully written articles study the so called dark continent', hidden or unknown areas of womanhood, that are often felt to be difficult to approach, understand, or conceptualise.