From Lack to Excess in Words: Lacanian Reading of Palace of Sad Birds and The Previous Stroke

Despite human reliance on language as a means of conveying messages and a tool that apparently satisfies major needs, Lacan believed that language is not only insufficient for human being as a subject of desire, but can also cause him/her to stay away from his/her lost purpose and desire. According to Lacan, language is the realm of the unconscious. Hence, it satisfies not the demand of the ego but the desire of The Other; Therefore, for its reproduction, it must rely on two constructive elements, "lack" and "excess", in order to remain stable. In this research, through qualitative and quantitative analysis and a Lacanian psychoanalytical reading of the stories Bakhtiar Ali’s Palace of Sad Birds and Mohammad Sohrabi’s The Previous Stroke, the following results are shown: The subject has accepted the lack of a phallus in his presence and has given himself to symbolic castration. This is true for Kamran, Khaled Amon, Mansour Asreen and the narrator of The Previous Stroke. Also, Susan's purpose in sending her suitors to travel and leave the city is to turn them into subjects of desire, For Susan, "the city", "war" and signifiers that referred to it are jouissance and representatives of excess desire. The narrator of The Previous Stroke tries to fill the lack of the other as the lack of speech through swearing. Of course, the lack is never filled in speech because the speech always exceeds his intention.
Despite human reliance on language as a means of conveying messages and a tool that apparently satisfies major needs, Lacan believed that language is not only insufficient for human being as a subject of desire, but can also cause him/her to stay away from his/her lost purpose and desire. According to Lacan, language is the realm of the unconscious. Hence, it satisfies not the demand of the ego but the desire of The Other; Therefore, for its reproduction, it must rely on two constructive elements, "lack" and "excess", in order to remain stable. In this research, through qualitative and quantitative analysis and a Lacanian psychoanalytical reading of the stories Bakhtiar Ali’s Palace of Sad Birds and Mohammad Sohrabi’s The Previous Stroke, the following results are shown: The subject has accepted the lack of a phallus in his presence and has given himself to symbolic castration. This is true for Kamran, Khaled Amon, Mansour Asreen and the narrator of The Previous Stroke. Also, Susan's purpose in sending her suitors to travel and leave the city is to turn them into subjects of desire, For Susan, "the city", "war" and signifiers that referred to it are jouissance and representatives of excess desire. The narrator of The Previous Stroke tries to fill the lack of the other as the lack of speech through swearing. Of course, the lack is never filled in speech because the speech always exceeds his intention.