The self and the farewell from the Other. Beyond normal and pathological mourning

Although Freud's essay much greater thanMourning and Melancholymuch less than sparked off a productive discussion of these two phenomena, theoretical discussion on the two terms has made little or no progress for some time now. Nevertheless, the dubious expression much greater thanwork of mourningmuch less than is freely used not only in clinical discourse, the operative assumption usually being that this much greater thanworkmuch less than ultimately serves to support the normal cessation of mourning. By contrast, chronic, unceasing mourning is ascribed extraordinarily pathological potential. However, between these two alternatives there is a third form of mourning that neither separates us from the Other by depriving us of grieving memory nor leads inexorably to a pathological clinch. The function of this kind of mourning has regularly been ignored or mistaken. Accordingly, the article sets out to essay a critical engagement with Freud's distinction between pathological and normal mourning and to legitimize a different approach to the much greater thanfarewell from the Othermuch less than.