The Lost Object and the Mobius Strip in Hamidi Balkhi’s Maqamat-e Hamidi: A Lacanian Approach

Some consider Jacques Lacan to be the first theorist to incorporate modern linguistics into psychoanalysis. By interweaving psychoanalysis and socio-political analysis, he achieves a new understanding of “subjectivity” and expresses new interpretations about the Symbolic and social reality. In this regard, he achieves a new concept of the “symbolic-social” order, meaning that any split in the “subject” means a break in the Other. This research aims to examine the relationship between the absent “signifier” and the missing links of the “lost object” in the stories of Maqamat-e Hamidi and to show how their language is transformed in accordance with Lacan’s structural and signifying order. The main question of this study is how metalanguage and social-discursive formations are expressed through the unconscious and the symbolic orders of the subject and narrator of Maqamat. The results of the study show that the fantasy of constructing a totalitarian utopia manifests as disorder and disruption in reality, embodied by the antagonistic protagonist. The protagonist, through the performative play of signification and novel representation of the Real, offers the subject the promise of attaining the lost object. But the protagonist, as the Other, prevents the subject from entering the realm of meaning; thus, the fantasy of constructing social discourse is postponed. In this regard, both the subject and the protagonist are structurally void.
 
Extended Abstract
1. Introduction
Qazi Hamid al-Din Balkhi’s Maqamat-e Hamidi comprises twenty-three anecdotes. The central focus and main theme of the stories is the endless search for an elusive, unattainable lost object or, in a way, an attempt to find a meaningful, directional meaning, which prompts the narrator to begin each story with a reference to an anecdote from his youth. In each anecdote, the narrator often embarks on a long journey for a specific purpose; as the narrative unfolds, the entry of a deceptive and demanding protagonist changes the course of events. The hero appears in different guises and encourages the public to do different things. After achieving his goal through begging, he flees just as the narrator sees the protagonist within a stone’s throw of him.
2. Methodology
Informed by Lacan’s theories and adopting a psychoanalytic approach, the present study investigates Hamidi’s narratives. The recurrent Lacanian concepts are: the lost object, the Möbius strip, the quilting point, the empty sign, and the Real.
3. Theoretical Framework
Lacan calls the residual pleasure that remains from the immediate satisfaction of the child’s need by the mother’s breast the “lost object.” According to him, before the child uses his pathological organs and bodily manifestations to satisfy his need, the mother, as the “other,” satisfies his need. With this intervention, the mother invites the child into her own semantic and discursive world. The child’s viewing of the image of the “other” establishes a narcissistic relationship that is necessary for the objectification of the child’s external world. However, the memory trace and image of the first satisfaction, which was tied to the mother’s signifying network, are reinforced in the child’s memory, and the next time his instinctive impulses are activated, he seeks to renew the illusion that was obtained from the image of the first satisfaction. In the interval between these two satisfactions, something has disappeared and the child constantly looks for the lost object or the last irreducible reserve of libido in the subject that appears unknown to him. Since subsequent satisfactions do not correspond to the initial satisfaction, the child seeks to recover the lost jouissance by creating fantasy; however, this gap is never filled, so the subject leaps from one desire to another, which indicates a struggle to find an impossible desire, and replaces one object with another.
4. Discussion and Analysis
The narrator of Maqamat-e Hamidi constantly recounts the past in all of the anecdotes and travels around to rediscover the pleasures and joys of that era. On all his journeys, he encounters a community of people who have gathered around the beggared orator and listen to his boasting. Although in all anecdotes the art of rhetoric is the one that captivates the narrator, in essence, it is the missing object that appears in different forms and causes the narrator to travel to distant lands. This object appears in different forms in all twenty-three anecdotes, in the form of love, war, etc., and the narrator, for some reason, keeps travelling. He encounters a preacher who transforms the symbolic games of those around him and encourages them to take action. Thus, in the first stage, the narrator is immediately captivated by the hero’s impressive speeches and is dominated by his inner space. In the second stage, the narrator realises that he is in a passive state and that an absent person is running the show. At this stage, the hero flees after begging and receiving provisions. The hero’s sudden absence, inconsistent with the previous rhythm, fills the narrator with excitement and a surge of fear of losing his existence. Here, the hero takes the omniscient point of view from which he sees the subject, while the subject cannot see him. Therefore, the hero’s position in a blind and invisible space takes on the function of the lost object.
5. Conclusion
The findings indicate that each anecdote is structured around the obsessive repetition of a primal memory, and these memories repeatedly overlap in an attempt to achieve the same original goal. In this regard, the antagonist is the primary object that becomes a symbol and sign for continuous signification; meaning that every presence implicitly entails a disappearance, a kind of breaking of the subject from itself and returning to itself. Through this, the subject becomes its own object and finds no outlet for satisfaction. The protagonist, through the performative play of signification and novel representation of the Real, offers the subject the promise of attaining the lost object. But the protagonist, as the Other, prevents the subject from entering the realm of meaning; thus, the fantasy of constructing social discourse is postponed. In this regard, both the subject and the protagonist are structurally void.
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