Psychoanalysis and . . . by Richard Feldstein and Henry Sussman (review)

92Rocky Mountain Review poet, a difference of significance. On the other hand, it should be noted that N. Scott Momaday, an American Kiowa Indian and author of House Made of Dawn, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel published in 1968, observes: "I have a difficult time understanding what 'American Indian' writing is. I know I've read things on American Indian experience by both Indians and non-Indians, and I'm not able to make for myself any important distinctions" (63). The interviews develop a wide cross section ofsocial attitudes ranging from the more radical young artists to those who have come up through the system and those who reaffirm the proud heritage of a people through reawakening them to their mythology and origins. Few, if any, project optimism when contemplating the future ofhumanity. One ofthe more memorable interviews is with Paula Gunn Allen, now working on a novel tentatively titled Raven's Road in which she uses the ?-Bomb as an apocalyptic plot element. The novelist notes the irony that uranium was first mined at Laguna in a form called yellowcake, and that a Laguna woman's face is painted yellow with some red spots when she dies. "The Bomb," observes Allen, "is about cleansing the planet; it is about the voice of another power. There are reasons why I see it that way, some ofwhich are metaphysical" (106). "They haven't cared about ultimate extinction before. They have extinguished race after race, and all the species of animals who ever lived—right now 99 percent are extinct—and nobody cared. Now all of a sudden . . ." (107). Readers who peruse this book will, no doubt, find most satisfaction in the interviews with those writers and poets who reflect their own literary interests. For me, Jimmy Santiago Baca and Rudolfo Anaya were particularly rewarding as they discussed the manner in which mythology had nurtured them in "a putting together of everything in a modern sense" (100), as Baca phrases it. "We have not only the story to write," says Anaya, "we also have to remind our people about their culture and their language, things that are under that threat that we talked about right now, and liable to disappear if we don't look closely at ourselves in a historical process—and part of analyzing that historical process is not only story and myth and legend and tradition, it's a political space we occupy" (91). Momaday, Anaya, Allen, and Baca all discuss the role of myth as a force in preserving cultural origins. The University of New Mexico Press can take pride in this newest addition to its impressive list of publications on Southwestern literature and writers. Beginning with the definitive introduction by Crawford, the reader can wander at will in and out of the interviews and receive an enlightening insight into the critical theories and approaches of an increasingly significant group of regional writers. GLEN NEWKIRK University of Nebraska at Omaha RICHARD FELDSTEIN and HENRY SUSSMAN. Psychoanalysis and .... New York: Routledge, 1990. 224 p. This collection of thirteen articles is divided into seven sections; the title of each section provides a different second term for the phrase, "Psychoanalysis Book Reviews93 and . . . ." The writers gathered here represent disciplines ranging from feminism to film theory, and their essays vary in approach to the topic, offering "psychoanalysis as critique as well as critiques of psychoanalysis" (4). This is an excellent book for graduate courses because it acquaints the student not only with historical and current developments in psychoanalysis and critical theory, but also with the "lingo" of these discourse communities. In keeping with the book's focus, then, the challenge I face as a reviewer is to acknowledge the self-reflexive nature ofcriticism, to own up to my status as "the fractured, symptomatic critic who [is] supposed to know" (3). I found the most informative essays were those that provide historical context for psychoanalysis in their particular fields, those by Nelson, Flieger, Ross, and Sussman. More difficult but equally valuable articles by Weber, Fineman, Gallop, Kahane, Feldstein, and Bernheimer illustrate applied psychoanalytic theory. The fact that I experienced what I call "moments ofopacity" in reading articles by Ragland-Sullivan, Zizek, and Salvaggio...