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"[[Lack]]" ([[Fr]]. ''[[manque]]'')

However, the precise nature of what is [[lack]]ing varies over the course of [[Lacan]]'s [[Works of Jacques Lacan|work]].

When the term first appears, in 1955, [[lack]] designates first and foremost a [[lack]] of [[being]].

<blockquote>Desire is a relation of being to lack. The lack is the lack of being properly speaking. It isn't the lack of this or that, but lack of being whereby the being exists."<ref>{{S2}} p.223</ref></blockquote>

[[Lacan]] returns to this theme in 1958, when he argues that [[desire]] is the [[metonymy]] of the [[lack]] of [[being]] (''manque à être''; translated by Sheridan as "want-to-be").<ref>{{E}} p.259</ref>

[[Lacan]] contrasts the [[lack]] of [[being]], which relates to [[desire]], with the [[lack]] of having (''manque à avoir''), which relates to [[demand]].<ref>{{Ec}} p.730</ref>

In 1956, [[lack]] comes to designate the [[lack]] of an [[object]].

[[Lacan]] distinguishes between three kinds of [[lack]], according to the nature of the [[object]] which is [[lack]]ing, as shown in the figure below.<ref>{{S4}} p.269</ref>

In 1957, when [[Lacan]] introduces the [[algebraic]] [[symbol]] for the [[bar]]red [[Other]] (<strike>A</strike>), [[lack]] comes to designate the [[lack]] of a [[signifier]] in the [[Other]].