Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection

Julia Kristeva, a Bulgarian-French philosopher, linguist, and psychoanalyst, first published Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection in France in 1980. The English edition appeared in 1982. The work is a philosophical study of the concept of the “abject,” a complex term referring to that which disturbs, undermines, or breaks down the border between the self and others. The human response to the abject is horror and nausea. In Powers of Horror, Kristeva examines the abject in art and literature; the cultural and societal use of abjection through taboos and prohibitions; and human psychosexual development. Kristeva applies a structuralist, psychoanalytic lens to her analysis, building on the works of Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan and referring to a wide range of literary, historical, and religious figures and their writings. Powers of Horror provides insights for feminist, queer, new historical, psychoanalytical, and cultural theories and illuminates the intersections between them.

This guide is based on the 1982 Columbia University Press edition, translated into English by Leon S. Roudiez.

Content Warning: The source text refers to many disturbing and grotesque images and includes an extended discussion of a writer known for his antisemitism and pro-Nazi sentiments.

Summary

Powers of Horror opens with a survey and unpacking of Kristeva’s theoretical project concerning abjection. Throughout the book, Kristeva draws on a wide range of historical, religious, philosophical, and literary references to build her arguments.

The abject has many forms, but it essentially refers to that which both comprises and threatens borders between the self and others. The human response to abjection is horror, vomit, and nausea. For Kristeva, the human corpse is the paradigm of the abject, causing horror because it shows the viewer what they will inevitably become.

Kristeva posits a psychosexual model of human development and theorizes that the abject arises when the infant is separated from the mother, something the infant must do to survive. Although influenced by Sigmund Freud’s and Jacques Lacan’s theories, Kristeva marks out her own territory in the description of the Semiotic stage of development, a preverbal, pre-Oedipean phase in which the infant does not see itself as separate from the mother. However, the infant must separate from the mother and develop as a subject or individual. This results in “primal repression,” another of Kristeva’s key concepts. When this separation occurs, the infant rejects the maternal boundary and their early memories of the Semiotic and the mother/infant bond are repressed into the subconscious mind. This stage is necessary for the infant to enter the Symbolic world of language, which is also the world of the father, but it can result in feelings of alienation. Kristeva is primarily concerned with how the infant grows into a speaking subject, separate from and aware of objects other than itself.

Kristeva next undertakes a discussion of how religious systems use prohibitions and taboos to suppress a child’s Oedipal desire for the mother. In addition, she distinguishes between filth and defilement, arguing that religion offers the means of purification from defilement and contact with the abject. Kristeva specifically addresses Jewish and Christian belief structures and the rules set out biblically for believers. She identifies confession, a spoken admission of contact with the abject, as a purifying ritual.

After her theoretical and historical examination of the abject, she moves to a critique of Journey to the End of the Night, a novel by French writer Louis-Ferdinand Céline. He is a controversial writer, having supported the Nazi regime during World War II. He also wrote a series of virulent anti-Semitic texts. Kristeva, while not condoning his ideas, argues that his writing demonstrates the power of the abject to create horror, grief, and laughter. Céline writes that to be human means to suffer. Using excerpts from his novel, Kristeva demonstrates the range of Céline’s avant-garde and experimental writing. He also describes grotesque injuries and bodily fluids, all examples of the abject. She concludes her discussion of Céline with a close reading of his style. Céline breaks apart syntax and grammar and uses ellipses, fragmenting his prose to introduce spoken language into written text. As she examines his writing, Kristeva’s style becomes increasingly poetic and syntactically experimental.

In the final chapter of the book, Kristeva confronts modernist nihilism, questioning how one continues in a world of suffering and without meaning. She concludes that literature is the only way forward; rather than resisting the abject, literature and art make visible what was hidden. In so doing, she suggests, it is necessary for psychoanalysts to confront the abject since it will continue to insert itself into the culture, and people will develop phobias and mental health conditions as a result. She concludes that only the beauty of literature can collapse the abject.