Interrogating the Real

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by Slavoj Zizek

Continuum Publishing

Due/Published July 2005, 336 pages, cloth

ISBN 0826471102

"The most formidably brilliant exponent of psychoanalysis, indeed of cultural theory in general, to have emerged from Europe in some decades.'" -- Terry Eagleton

Interrogating the Real is the first volume of the collected writings of Slavoj Zizek. Drawing upon the full range of his prolific output, the articles here cover psychoanalysis, philosophy and popular culture. These essays not only reflect the remarkable breadth and depth of Zizek's interest in politics, culture and philosophy, but also showcase his sometimes controversial, but always entertaining style. Over course of the collection, a full and clear sense of Zizekian philosophy emerges, derived from Hegelian dialectics, Marxist politics and Lacanian psychoanalysis. At the same time, Zizek's witty and accessible approach to his subject matter remains constant throughout, and his choice of exemplars from pop culture - from Holywood movies to pulp literature - ensures that this is a consistently fresh and surprising body of work.

Thematically organised, the book is divided into four sections and includes a new preface by Zizek himself, as well as an introduction by the editors and a helpful glossary for those coming to Zizek's work for the first time. This collection, along with the second volume - The Universal Exception - is an excellent introduction to the work of one of the most inspiring, provocative and entertaining cultural critics at work today.

Contents

Preface by Slavoj Zizek

'The Thing Itself' Appears: Introducing the Work of Slavoj Zizek

Part One: Lacanian Orientations
1. The Society for Theoretical Psychoanalysis in Yugoslavia
2. 'Pathological Narcissus' as a Socially Mandatory Form of Subjectivity
3. The Limits of the Semiotic Approach to Psychoanalysis
4. Alfred Hitchcock, or, The Form and its Historical Mediation

Part Two: Lacan Among the Philosophers
5. The Most Sublime of Hysterics
6. The Eclipse of Meaning: On Lacan and Deconstruction
7. A Hair of the Dog That Bit You
8. Hegel, Lacan, Deleuze: Three Strange Bedfellows
9. From Proto-Reality to the Act
10. The Parallaz View

Part Three: From Fantasy to Fetishism
11. Between Symbolic Fiction and Fantasmic Spectre: Towards a Lacanian Theory of Ideology
12. Re-visioning 'Lacanian' Social Criticism: The Law and its Obscene Double
13. The Matrix, or, The Two Sides of Perversion
14. From Virtual Reality to the Virtualization of Reality
15. Lacan Between Cultural Studies and Cognitivism

Part Four: The Answer of the Real
16. From Philosophy to Popular Culture: Connections of the Freudian Field
17. ' Woman is one of the names-of-the-father', or, How Not to Misread Lacan's Formulas of Sexation
18. Love Beyond the Law
19. The Thing from Inner Space: Titanic and Deep Impact
20. The Real of Sexual Difference

Glossary