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The [[concept ]] of "[[being ]] in [[love]]" was investigated by [[Christian ]] David in L'État amoureux, published in 1971, at a [[time ]] when his [[ideas ]] [[about ]] psychosomatics were changing. David continued to believe in the importance of questioning the fluctuations to which [[mental ]] [[processes ]] were exposed, but he now stressed those generated through the [[encounter ]] with the [[other ]] rather than those implied by a [[physical ]] [[presence]].

Overall, his study attempts to point out the [[internal ]] [[behavior ]] of the [[subject ]] confronted, through this encounter, with the [[state ]] of "being in love." For David this state is characterized by a [[form ]] of subjectification that has two components: the subjectification of the [[drive ]] in the face of the specific [[trauma ]] caused by love, and the ability to integrate the [[narcissistic ]] release implied by the encounter with the loved one. With respect to the subjectification of the love trauma, Sigmund [[Freud]], who is quoted by David, sees it as similar to the [[work ]] of [[mourning ]] or dreaming. The analogy enables him to emphasize the [[singular ]] quality of this type of [[activity]], where the drive is immobilized at the crossroads of destiny and constantly re-released through the encounter with the other. Through this encounter the subject is constantly [[forced ]] to confront the necessary [[death ]] of the ego. "Where love is awakened, ego, that somber despot dies," writes David, [[repeating ]] Freud's quote of Jalal el Din (1911c).

One of the basic premises of David's book is to explain love as a narcissistic [[disturbance]]. The concomitant risk of forcing the subject to confront the most [[primitive ]] dimensions of the drive is one that may restore the condition of [[narcissism]]. These aspects are at work in the [[tragedy ]] of Penthesilea by Heinrich von Kleist, a [[text ]] for which David provides a [[psychoanalytic ]] [[reading]]. In the [[myth ]] Penthesilea, queen of the Amazons, is in love with [[Achilles ]] and loved by him. In the end she kills her lover and devours him with the [[help ]] of her dogs. However, the [[violence ]] of the drama underscores the [[necessity ]] of a two-sided abandonment: abandonment of proximity to the being onto whom the subject projects his [[ideal]], and abandonment of preserving intact the contours and limits of the ego. While the [[work of mourning ]] flattens the contours of [[experience]], the mental work required by the love trauma restores to it the variety and [[truth ]] of its nuances. But to do this requires subjectification. At the extreme, this subjectification can assume the aspect of an "[[affective ]] [[perversion]]," like that expressed by Nathaniel in Gide's The Fruits of the Earth, when he exclaims, "My desires have given me more than the possession of the [[object ]] of those desires." In a [[sense ]] the work implied by being in love, including "affective perversion," mirrors the effort [[therapy ]] [[demands ]] of the [[patient ]] caught up in [[transference ]] love.

See also: [[Empathy]]; [[Friendship]]; Racker, Heinrich.