Between archive and screen. Languages of the unsayable in the case of Sabina Spielrein

Abstract

In 1977, a remarkable archival discovery revealed a haunting tale of sexual repression and transgression, of rivalry and deceit, of Eros and Thanatos, a story so richly layered in ambiguity that even fiction would struggle to conjure a more compelling narrative. A carton in the basement of the Former Institute of Psychology in Geneva containing Sabina Spielrein’s diaries and her extensive correspondence with Carl Gustav Jung and Sigmund Freud ignited what Derrida would term “archive fever”, or “le mal d’archive”, and the quest for lost or concealed documents feverishly began. [extract]