Amor y goce

Conversation with Rosa María López
​3rd floor Conference Room

The ideal that love can replace war sums up a reaction movement to events that occurred during the first half of the 20th century: two world wars and the release of atomic bombs.

Sigmund Freud’s generation knew a completely different world to that of its parents, which was held fast by faith in Reason, a sense of security and the illusion of a promising future. Freud was not deluded and anticipated that the layer of brilliance of that civilisation was so thin that it could be pierced at any moment by the forces of hell, which are none other than the death drive that resides in every human being.

Fortunately, the destructive force of Thanatos is countered by the constructive force of Eros. The relationship between the two tendencies shapes each life in its uniqueness, as well as the course of history. When the action of Thanatos (enjoyment) meets the limit imposed by Eros (love and desire) things go well. However, if the death drive is released from this love, it leads to war between nations, family wars, war between the sexes and even a person’s internal war.

The reason for this grievous fate of the speaking being needs to be understood. Núria Güell’s video-projection Paraules d’amor. Un assaig sobre les passions will allow us to discuss things that escape words.

​Rosa María López is a psychoanalyst, member of the World Association of Psychoanalysis (WAP), a professor at the Institute of the Freudian Field and director of the Department of Psychopathology at Nucep. She has published numerous articles in specialised journals in France, Brazil, Argentina, the UK and Spain.