The Genesis of Desire

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments It is to René Girard that I owe the desire that has animated me for thirty years and has given me the energy necessary to my research in psychological theory as well as in clinical psychology. I openly recognize this desire as mimetic. I am also indebted to Girard for teaching me how to read the great texts of literature and philosophy without being intimidated by them, and with a joyous irreverence, enabling me to develop a new understanding of the theories I have read and the phenomena I have observed. For some years, absorbed in my clinical activity and my teaching responsibilities , I have published little except articles in scientific periodicals. It was Girard again who introduced me to Benoît Chantre, whose heartening friendship encouraged me and kept me company throughout the writing of this book. My work on this book has also benefited from the attentive and demanding collaboration of Jeanne Barzilaï, who has helped me to clarify and give shape to my ideas. As far as the English translation is concerned, I am deeply grateful to my friend Eugene Webb, who had already translated my book The Puppet of Desire, making it available to the American public, and who also very kindly agreed to translate the present book. Eugene’s work is more than a translation, because he has added to the original text much of his experience and his great intellectual rigor. I also wish to express my appreciation to my friend Trevor Merrill for his constant support and for compiling the index. Trevor is a brilliant scholar, totally bilingual, and certainly the most knowledgeable in mimetic research among the younger Girardians. ix x Acknowledgments I have also been formed by all those who have taught me, corrected me, inspired me, and directed me during my life, by successive identifications, first with my parents, then with my teachers and with all those close to me, and also with the friends who have influenced me. Each of them has become a part of me, and each lives in my appreciative and affectionate memory. ...