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The "[[work of mourning]]" is a set of [[mental ]] [[processes]], [[conscious ]] and [[unconscious]], initiated by the [[loss ]] of an emotionally and instinctually cathected [[object]]. Once this work is [[complete]], the [[subject ]] is gradually able, within a period of time that cannot be shortened, to [[separate ]] from the [[lost object]].

Extreme [[pain]], [[denial ]] of [[reality]], [[hallucination ]] of the [[presence ]] of the object, and [[awareness ]] of the loss of the object are experienced in sequence. Eventually the mental changes occur that allow attachment to new [[objects ]] to develop.

The [[notion ]] of the work of mourning was introduced by [[Freud ]] in "Mourning and [[Melancholia]]" (1916-17g [1915]). He seems to have been particularly concerned with [[death ]] and mourning at the time—the middle of the First [[World ]] War, when everyone in [[Europe ]] was dealing with such losses—for these issues are also mentioned in "[[Thoughts ]] for the [[Times ]] on War and Death" (1915b) and "On Transience" (1916a [1915]).

Having lost his [[father ]] in 1896, Freud had himself experienced grief and mourning; his father's death is mentioned in The [[Interpretation ]] of [[Dreams ]] (1900a). The long hiatus between that death and Freud's conceptualization of the work of mourning underlines the cardinal [[role ]] of the passage of time in this context: Freud's own mourning preceded by far the greater part of his written work, a fact that reminds us not to confuse the [[psychic ]] work of mourning with any kind of [[intellectual ]] work. Talking, reflecting, or [[writing ]] [[about ]] a [[bereavement ]] does not amount to a work of mourning. Intellectual [[mastery ]] or the [[power ]] of discernment are not of much [[help ]] when it comes to reassembling everything associated with the lost object. Finding [[words ]] to express the pain, the unimaginable distress caused by the loss, is usually an insurmountable task as much for those who seek to console as for the bereaved. On the [[other ]] hand, [[particular ]] words may sometimes indeed evoke the lost object or a recognizable link to that object, but the forms of such [[speech ]] cannot be predicted or laid down in advance.

"What is painful may none the less be [[true]]," wrote Freud in "On Transience" (1916a [1915], p. 305). This remark, made a few months after he composed "Mourning and Melancholia," encapsulates an essential part of his [[thinking ]] on mourning. Accepting the [[truth ]] of the object's [[disappearance ]] involves [[suffering]]. The work of mourning is not unlike the work—the "labor"—of childbirth. Any [[birth ]] takes time, and, like truth, is the outcome of a creative [[process]]. The truth of a loss acknowledged is no exception to this rule.

For Freud the pain of mourning was an enigma. What to the ordinary mortal seems obvious and inevitable posed an insoluble problem for the inventor of [[psychoanalysis]]. Viewing the cruelest of patent facts as a question to be answered exemplifies the heuristic approach of psychoanalysis, for which the patent is not the true—indeed, it may even hide the truth. Anyone agreeing to accompany the mourner during this depressive process will be obliged to [[experience ]] it in himself, and for himself.

The main point of "Mourning and Melancholia" is to show how these two states have certain depressive traits in common. In addition to a highly contagious [[feeling ]] of sadness, the two share [[three ]] characteristics: loss of interest in the [[outside ]] world, loss of the capacity to [[love]], and the [[inhibition ]] of all [[activity]]. The suspension of interest in the outside world is indicated by the disappearance, from one day to the next, of all attention directed toward the [[environment]], close or distant. What was of the highest importance yesterday ceases utterly to [[exist ]] today. The only other [[state ]] displaying such a marked [[narcissistic ]] [[withdrawal ]] is [[sleep]]. In that [[case]], [[being ]] cut off from the outside world facilitates access to the intimacy of the inner world, of unconscious wishes, by way of [[another ]] kind of psychic work, namely the [[dream]]-work. Could it be that, as in dreams, withdrawal into mourning makes it possible to organize the world not on the basis of [[external ]] perceptions, but on the basis of a [[subjectivity ]] turned completely inward? Inasmuch as sleep is a prerequisite of mental recuperation, a [[chance ]] to start again relying on one's inner resources, it would seem reasonable to conclude that a kind of psychic restoration likewise occurs through mourning, with its deferment of all outside stimuli; that the loss of a cathected object requires a psychic reorganization so absorbing that it means confining all [[cathexis ]] to the [[internal ]] world. There are in fact few tasks more engrossing than taking stock of what will never again exist.

This withdrawal of object-[[libido]], and the [[dismantling ]] of all the bonds that have hitherto united subject and object, is bound to result in the second abovementioned common feature of mourning and melancholia, namely loss of the capacity to love. Exaggerated concentration on oneself prevents any consideration of [[others ]] and blocks any expression of affection. For the time being, the [[cathexes ]] available to the ego cannot be directed onto objects. Freud did not confine himself to this [[economic ]] view, however, in his interpretation of the disappearance of all loving impulses toward objects. He speculated that any potential attachment to another object could imply the lost object's replacement. By taking care not to become attached to a new object, the subject was in effect defending himself against the charge of lethal intentions with respect to the lost one. But to imagine, as a [[defense]], that one might have an impact on the outside world—be the [[cause]], in the [[event]], of the object's disappearance—is itself a way of refusing reality. For the object's finite [[nature ]] [[exists ]] in that outside world, irrespective of the subject's wishes; it is, precisely, what is at stake in the subject's [[relationship ]] with reality.

Meanwhile, cutting oneself off from [[external reality ]] paradoxically implies the [[necessity ]] to acknowledge it. The psychic [[working ]] out of the loss on the plane of subjectivity and object relationships leads to the subject's detachment from other aspects of reality also. From this derives the [[third ]] corollary of mourning, the inhibition of all activity. Inaction and indifference to outside reality do not arise exclusively, however, from absorption in the work of mourning. Such indifference indeed includes attempts to deny the reality of object-loss by denying all reality. Oscillation between the [[recognition ]] of reality and its denial accounts for the contradictory and circular tendencies often observed in this context.

The experience of mourning is paradoxical. Overcoming the loss of an object means an exaggerated presence of that object in the psychic activity of the bereaved. The work of mourning may thus be defined as an excessive attention paid to an object in [[order ]] to come to [[terms ]] with its definitive demise.

# [[Freud, Sigmund]]. (1915b). Thoughts for the times on war and death. SE, 14: 273-300.