In Support of Philosophy 1973–1976 285
A little further on, Lacan tackles slightly more specifi cally what
had ‘rather frightened him’, treating The Wolf Man’s Magic Word,
‘by a certain Nicolas Abraham and a certain Maria Torok’, as if
it were a rather untimely echo of his own discourse on the Wolf
Man. But he soon returned to what in his eyes was the main thing:
Derrida’s preface. It was the fi rst time Lacan had talked about
Derrida since the publication of ‘The factor of truth’ in Poétique.
And he did so with no holds barred.
There’s one thing that, I have to say, surprises me even more
than the spread, the spread – which I know perfectly well is
happening –, the spread of what is called my teaching, my
ideas [.. .], one thing that surprises me even more: not the fact
that The Wolf Man’s Magic Word, not only does it fl oat along,
but it’s breeding, it’s the fact that someone I didn’t know –
to tell the truth, I think he’s in analysis – that I didn’t know
was in analysis – but this is a mere hypothesis – it’s a certain
Jacques Derrida who’s written a preface to this Magic Word.
He writes an absolutely fervent, enthusiastic preface in which
I think I can perceive a throbbing that is linked – I don’t know
which of the two analysts he is dealing with – what is certain
is that he couples them; and I don’t think, I have to say, even
though I set things going in this path, I don’t think this book,
or this preface, are in very good taste. Under the rubric of
delirium, that’s the way I’ll tell you about it, I can’t say it’s in
the hope you’ll go and see; I’d even prefer you to give up such
an idea, but anyway at the end of the day I know that you’ll
rush to Aubier-Flammarion, even if only to see what I call an
extreme.^52And Lacan went on to conclude that he was ‘scared’ by what he felt
‘more or less responsible for, namely having opened the sluice gates
of something that [he] could just as well have shut.’ The remark on
Derrida’s apparently being in analysis unleashed the hilarity of the
audience; he was soon informed about it. Others did not hesitate
to relay the rumour afterwards, as Derrida mentioned in The Post
Card.* Ten years later, he returned to the incident at the conference
‘Lacan with the Philosophers’.^53
- ‘In Montreal, during a very well attended lecture, Serge Doubrovsky had wanted
to get a certain eff ect from some news that he believed he could bring to the know-
ledge of his audience: I was supposed to be in analysis! A swollen head, don’t you
think? [.. .] Remark, I’m not so surprised. Once that upon the appearance of the
Verbier [Magic Word] and of Fors Lacan let himself go at it right in his seminar
(while running the risk of then retracting the faux-pas under ellipsis in Ornicar [.. .]),
the rumour in a way became legitimate’ (The Post Card, pp. 202–3).