Psychopathology: Theory and Practice

The History of Murder – and the Murder of History

In this detailed theoretical and case-based presentation, Dr Ronald Doctor considers the many-faceted but mostly concealed psychological states and experiences underlying the act of murder. In most cases, killing occurs concretely only after it has been committed many times previously in dreams, nightmares and unconscious fantasies that have never become conscious. Before the deed, conscious efforts – sometimes unconscious too – are designed and devoted to keeping the impulse to murder encapsulated to prevent action. Commonly a sudden reversal takes place internally that breaks the murderousness loose from its cordoned-off status. Ronald Doctor proposes that there is always an underlying psychically traumatic and indigestible experience of loss and death. Using clinical material from two patients who suffered severe loss he explains how they sought refuge: the first in psychosis, and the second in a sado-masochistic retreat.