Circumcision trauma in the Monkey Puzzle Boy and in the birth of psychoanalysis

A case history, an analysis of an artist with a history of childhood sexual abuse, takes a turn when The Cut by Carlo Bonomi comes to his attention. The construction of psychoanalysis and the Oedipal paradigm come into focus. In the same way, perhaps, as Freud created it, the analysand re-creates it in a way that suits a worldview that he is growing into. The significance of the trauma of circumcision is laid bare to him. Whereas Freud and Emma Eckstein became unconsciously and inextricably linked, this analysand uses knowledge of these new insights mixed with religion and myth to free himself of the belief system he was born into. He escapes Oedipus, reads Ferenczi and Bonomi, and is able to ameliorate his relationship with belief systems, psychoanalysis, and religion.