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CLINICAL NOTES
Sigmund Freud (1909-10). ‘A Special Type of Choice of Object Made by Men,’ On
Sexuality: Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality and Other Works (London: Penguin
Books, 1991), Penguin Freud Library, pp. 227-242.
Sigmund Freud first broached the topic of this paper in 1909 before the Vienna
Psychoanalytic Society.
It was published in German in 1910 and translated into English in 1925 and 1957.
This paper is the first of three essays that Freud wrote on the ‘psychology of love.’
The second and third papers in this series were published in 1912 and 1917
respectively.
Freud was interested in developing a theory of ‘object choice.’
This is a term that is used in psychoanalysis to study why the subject chooses to
mate, marry, and procreate with a particular woman.
The basic assumption in these studies is that the modalities of object choice in an
adult are affected by how he is situated to the oedipal matrix; the extent of primal
repression and repression proper that he was subject to; and on whether or not the
subject was successful in resolving the Oedipus complex before attaining manhood.
The theory of object choice is based on clinical data, Freudian meta-psychology, and
socio-literary representations of mating behaviour in humans.
The theory of object choice is also influenced by the Kantian tradition of ‘conditions
of possibility’ arguments.
But, unlike Kant’s philosophy, these are not ‘transcendental’ arguments; instead they
partake of the forms of pathology that Kant tried to avoid in his work.

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Freud invokes a softer version of Kant’s approach by using the phrase ‘necessary
conditions for loving,’ albeit in the context of a ‘special theory,’ rather than in the
form of a ‘general theory’ like Kant.
It is precisely because all the pre-conditions of loving cannot be enumerated in their
entirety to explain object choice that he finds it necessary to delineate them under the
category of ‘special types.’
Freud is also trying to emphasize the fact that his approach is empirical; it is
however not meant to be exhaustive.
In other words, it does not explain all forms of object choice (neurotic or otherwise).
Readers who are interested in this topic might want also want to read the work of
Klaus Theweleit.
Needless to say, what Freud has to teach us here pertains mainly to neurotic forms
of object choice.
These observations may also help us to explain object choice outside the confines of
the Freudian clinic.
Freud identifies four important pre-conditions in this particular type of object choice.
They are the following:
1. The first pre-condition for loving is that the subject is not interested in the
beloved unless there is an ‘injured third party’ involved.
This means that the subject will only try to mate with a woman who is
already in a relationship and not choose somebody unattached.

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A woman whom the subject does not find attractive will suddenly become
attractive if she is desired by somebody else.
The term ‘attractive’ should be understood here as ‘attractive for whom?’
This pre-condition relates to the idea that desire must be ‘mediated’ through
the identification with another subject in the locus of the Other.
The desiring subject may however not be conscious of the fact that his desire
is unconsciously mediated in the locus of the Other.
The work of René Girard and Jacques Lacan take this idea as far as it will go
in their theories of desire.
So even though Freud’s intent is to only state this pre-condition in the form of
a special theory, the Lacanian version of this pre-condition takes the form of a
general theory of object choice.
For Lacan, this model of desire is not just a neurotic predicament. It constitutes the
structure of human desire as such.
Hence, the Lacanian formulation, ‘desire is always desire of the Other.’
2. The second pre-condition is that a woman who is chaste is less attractive than
one who is of ‘bad repute.’
3. The neurotic subject may attribute much greater value to women who do not
have sexual integrity, and would like to get involved with a number of them.
4. The neurotic subject will then attempt to save the fallen woman and work-
through the fantasy of restoring her to the locus of sexual virtue.
These then are the four pre-conditions to this form of neurotic object choice.
Freud’s point is not that all neurotic object choices take this form. That is made
obvious in the next two essays in this series which take up some of these points
again.
Readers might recollect seeing a movie with these attributes of object choice in
the behaviour of the neurotic protagonist.

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There might be complicating factors as well to add excitement to the plot.
So, for instance, if the protagonist is an alcoholic, it will help to explain his
dysfunctional behaviour.
The alcohol is introduced into the plot in lieu of the neurosis since those who see
the film may not be aware of the theory of the neuroses.
They will then – for better or worse – incorrectly attribute the neurotic behaviour
of the protagonist to alcohol rather than to his neurosis.
This type of plot structure then makes it possible to cinematically depict neurotic
behaviour without expecting the audience to be acquainted with the finer points
of object choice or the theory of psychoanalysis.
It would not be a stretch to argue that alcohol is used to mask neurotic behaviour in
cinema.
Those who fall prey to the mask will lose out on important insights about human
behaviour in matters pertaining to neurotic forms of object choice.
There is also something tragic about plots like this where the object choice is
doomed from the start.
When the object choice is doomed to failure, the cinematic audience will be lulled
into thinking that it is because the protagonist has a bad habit rather than delve
into the depths of his unconscious motivations for making the kind of object
choices that he in fact makes in the first place.
What are the implications of these pre-conditions?
What exactly is neurotic about this form of behaviour?
Freud uses the term ‘neurotic’ either to mean behaviour that is ‘self-defeating’ or
that which is rooted in oedipal fantasies (which hold the neurotic subject in its
grip).
After identifying these four pre-conditions, Freud goes on to explain why the
neurotic subject behaves in accordance with these pre-conditions in situations
where he has to make an object choice.
The first pre-condition is related to the mediatory function of desire.
The second pre-condition is related to jealousy, which intensifies the neurotic
subject’s desire.
What function does jealousy further in the context of object choice?

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The neurotic subject knows deep-down that he is not really interested in the
beloved since his desire is mediated through the identification with the Other.
The intensification of jealousy will help to mask the fact that he is not really
interested in the object for himself.
Here we must differentiate between the ‘desire of the subject’ and ‘the desire of
the Other.’
The proof that the object is sexually desirable is related to the function of
triangulation; if the protagonist (i.e. the neurotic subject) wins the sexual object, it
will lead to a loss for his rival.
It is because the subject’s ‘rival’ knows better and still desires the sexual object
that makes the object irresistible.
If however the rival should find the sexual object unattractive and lets that be
known to the subject, it would have the opposite libidinal effect.
In the absence of jealousy, and the periodic intensification of jealousy, the
neurotic subject will suddenly lose interest in the sexual object.
That is, a gap will then emerge between the ‘desire of the subject’ and the ‘desire
of the Other,’ and the subject will decide not to pursue the sexual object.
So it is not the physical attributes of the sexual object as such (in the ontological
sense) which appear attractive to the neurotic subject though we cannot discount
the imaginary dimension in its entirety.
It is more a question of whether the symbolic Other takes those physical
attributes in the sexual object seriously or not; hence, the libidinal function of
triangulation.
The third and fourth pre-conditions relate to the subject’s need to ‘rescue’ the
sexual object, and relate directly to oedipal fantasies about the sexuality of the
mother.
Freud’s point is not that all the four pre-conditions will be activated in all such
cases. Instead, these pre-conditions are representative indications of how the
clinician can orient himself in matters pertaining to object-choice.
Here is an example:
What made Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy attractive to Aristotle Onassis?
Was it not the fact that she was Jack Kennedy’s widow?

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If Aristotle Onassis was merely looking for an attractive American woman, then
he would have been spoilt for choice.
In any case, that will not explain why he married Jackie Kennedy (given the
stringent conditions that she imposed on him when they did so). There was even
a Hollywood film on this theme.
Incidentally, Aristotle Onassis was not in love with Jackie Kennedy; it was an
arranged marriage.
But it would be fair to say that Aristotle desired her immensely.
The intensity of that desire however is related to the extent of his transference to
John F. Kennedy.
It was not enough to be a First Lady to get Aristotle’s attention.
It was even more important that the First Lady should have been desired by the
President when he was alive.
The significance of this example is that Aristotle is confronted by the desire to
save Jackie Kennedy from the trauma of being a widow.
But unlike the pre-conditions that Freud delineates, it is not Jackie who is lacking
in sexual morals in this instance, but President Kennedy himself (who was
rumoured to have had several affairs in the White House).
So Aristotle Onassis was affected not just by Jackie Kennedy, but by the fact that
Jackie and JFK made a collective impact as the first couple.
That is the impact that Aristotle Onassis thought that he might make by marrying
Jackie Kennedy.
This then is a specific instance of trying to understand how Freud’s theories of
object choice can help us to make sense of what is desirable and under what
conditions.
The analytic approach to object choice, to conclude, is relational; it is not
ontological in its orientation. Needless to say, we must differentiate between love
and desire in this context.
This approach is the opposite of how most of us think about object choice.
That is because we are not consciously aware of the difference between the
‘desire of the subject’ and the ‘desire of the Other’ and the four pre-conditions of
love that Sigmund Freud delineates in this essay.

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These clinical notes have not argued that Freud’s special theory is enough to
make sense of object choice, but it is an interesting beginning.
What is required going forward is the need to differentiate between the terms
‘love’ and ‘desire’ and identify the pre-conditions that constitute these affects.
Another limiting factor in Freud’s model is that it relates only to a heterosexual
model of desire.
What if it turned out that Aristotle loved Kennedy but only desired Jackie?
Would Freud’s pre-conditions of object choice then apply? If so, how?
In other words, we must remember that this essay is only meant to be a special
theory and not a general theory of object choice.
SHIVA KUMAR SRINIVASAN