The 50th issue of Psychoanalytic Writings… While determining the theme of this issue, we reflected on the journey of Psychoanalytic Writings from its very first day to the present. From the publication of the first issue to today, 25 years have passed; linear time tells us that a quarter of a century has elapsed. The legacy we inherited has been handed down from one generation to another and has reached the present day, showing us that what truly matters is not the number of issues or years, but continuity. Inevitably, transformations and changes have occurred throughout this process. This journey has allowed us to sense that time flows not only linearly but also cyclically.

Like the very first moment in which a baby comes into being in the minds of its parents, we too carry the excitement of that moment of beginning in every issue as we continue the tradition we have inherited. Psychoanalysis is not merely an archaeological excavation that attempts to uncover the buried traces of the past; it is also a mode of thought that seeks to understand how time is broken, bent, and reorganized. In psychoanalytic theory, time does not appear as something that flows along a straight line; rather, it emerges as a structure marked by layered traces, returning, deferred, and suspended. Psychoanalytic time does not operate according to the calendar, but through repetition, waiting, and the retroactive construction of meaning.

The analysand and the analyst, while together participating in the flow of time, simultaneously suspend it, bend it, and reorganize it. In this relationship, time acquires a dimension that is not merely measured, but felt, deferred, repeated, and at times emerging for the very first time. In this context, one of Freud’s most significant contributions to the concept of time is the idea of the timelessness of the unconscious. Repressed content does not remain confined to the past; it intrudes upon the present, returning through symptoms, parapraxes, or dreams. The compulsion to repeat (Wiederholungszwang) lays bare the traumatic nature of time.¹ Trauma is not an event that simply took place in the past; it is like a freezing of time that acquires meaning après-coup—that is, retroactively, when triggered by another event.

Laplanche and Pontalis define the concept of après-coup as follows: “Certain experiences, impressions, and memory traces are reworked at a later time, in the light of new experiences and by reaching another level of development. They thus acquire both a new meaning and a new psychic effectiveness.” In this definition, there are two opposing temporal arrows: one extending from the past to the present, and the other from the present back toward the past. This situation subverts the sequential understanding of time as yesterday–today–tomorrow, and re-signifies the past from the standpoint of the present.² This approach reveals that time functions not in a linear but in a non-sequential, discontinuous manner.

According to Sabbadini, the fact that the first differentiation between the infant and the object has not yet been established, along with the operation of primary processes, the pleasure principle, and primary narcissism, leads the infant to experience a form of time in which it can be everywhere and at every moment simultaneously. This experience resembles the timelessness of the unconscious. However, with the gradual establishment of object relations and the introduction of secondary processes and the reality principle, the infant moves toward a differentiated experience of time based on the distinction between past, present, and future.³

But can we speak of a concept of time for the infant before the ego has been integrated? In its earliest moments, the infant seems to carry all of time within itself. There is no one else; the infant is the world itself. When we think through Winnicott’s concepts, the continuity of “being” is determined only by the other—that is, by the outside. The infant first experiences its earliest moments as an undifferentiated part of a whole, not yet separated from the mother. The integrity of psychic life is constituted through various pathways and in momentary time segments; over time, this process evolves into longer and more variable continuities.

In the infant’s psychic life, the concept of time is born with the first disappointments and separations. The perception of time is an indicator of an awareness of the distinction between self and non-self, inside and outside. As the external object comes into being, time also comes into being. Time is needed both to separate from the object and to relate to it. Interruptions in object continuity initiate the first signs of time in the infant: through the inevitable delay between desire and satisfaction. Repetitive times, in certain situations, evolve into irreversible moments. The growing infant’s internal time is shaped by the disappearance of the object. If the object has never disappeared, reality testing would not be possible. For “the prerequisite for the establishment of reality is that objects which once brought satisfaction have been lost.”⁴ The “absence” of the object reflects the pains of separation between desire and defense, self and object, mother and infant, and may hinder the emergence of temporality.⁵ And time… is almost like the summary of time itself: everything is eternal and nothing is lost.⁶

The 50th issue is, for us, not merely a threshold, but a point of discontinuity that accumulates the past and calls forth the future. To turn back and look, to remember, to think again, to think from within time, and perhaps to try to hear what has not yet been said… And we would like to extend our sincere thanks to those who imagined Psychoanalytic Writings and kept it alive and growing; to all the members of the Editorial and Advisory Boards who have assumed responsibility from past to present; to the staff of Bağlam Publishing who have devoted their labor to the preparation process for many years; to all the authors and translators who create and share generously; and to all those who have contributed at different levels, perhaps not directly identifiable. Once again, we express our gratitude to everyone whose paths have crossed in this psychoanalytic dream.

BEHİCE BORAN

CONTENTS

Presentation BEHİCE BORAN

Preface PSYCHOANALYTIC WRITINGS EDITORIAL BOARD

Après-coup: Loss or Excess of Meaning in Translation  ZEHRA KARABURÇAK ÜNSAL

From the Ignorance of Time to the Murder of Time  ANDRÉ GREEN / TRANSLATED BY / MERİL ALGAZİ

Deferred Action and the Circularity of Time RAŞİT TÜKEL

Anew EVREM TİLKİ

The Logical Times of Subjectivation BERNARD PENOT/ TRANSLATED BY/ BARAN GÜRSEL

Bion’s Dream-like Memory: Evolution and the Time of Psychoanalysis NERGİS AKÜZÜM

Psychoanalysis as a Myth of Modern Times HÜNER AYDIN

The Spirit of the Time: Artificial Intelligence and Psychoanalytic Theory ORÇUN AYKOL

Time Membrane EFSANE EBCİM

From the Realm of Dreams and Memories to the Streets: Three Orhan Pamuk Novels HARİKA YÜCEL ENGİNDENİZ

Time in Bursa ALİ ALGIN KÖŞKDERE

Sleep Trainings and Infant Sleep İREM GAMZE ARSLAN YÜKSEL

Remembering, Repeating and Working-Through SIGMUND FREUD / TRANSLATED BY / BARIŞHAN ERDOĞAN

Notes on the Possible Correspondence of Bion’s Concept of Function in Freud’s Text İLKER ÖZYILDIRIM

Letters to Psychoanalytic Writings on Its 25th Anniversary GÖVER KAZANCIOĞLU / AYÇA GÜRDAL KÜEY / ELDA ABREVAYA / RAŞİT TÜKEL

Summaries

Upcoming Issues

Style Guide

}}}