Since that time, narcissism has become a common phrase; in analytical literature, due to the significant obsession with the topic, the term is utilized more frequently than nearly any other’.[1]
The interpretation of narcissism has evolved over time. Presently, narcissism “refers to an interest in or concern with the self along a broad continuum, from healthy to pathological … encompassing concepts such as self-esteem, self-system, and self-representation, along with true or false self”.[2]
Before Freud
In Greek mythology, Narcissus was an attractive young man who spurned the fervent pursuits of the nymph Echo. As retribution, he was destined to fall in love with his own reflection in a body of water. Unable to fulfill his affection, Narcissus ‘lay gazing enraptured into the pool, hour after hour’,[3] and ultimately wasted away, transforming into a flower that carries his name, the narcissus.
The narrative was retold in Latin by Ovid in his Metamorphoses, and in such a form it greatly influenced medieval and Renaissance cultures. ‘Ovid’s tale of Echo and Narcissus…intertwines in most of the English instances of the Ovidian narrative poem’;[4] and ‘references to the story of Narcissus…play a significant role in the poetics of the Sonnets’[5] of Shakespeare. Here, the term used was ‘self-love…Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial fuel’.[6] Francis Bacon employed the same expression: ‘it is the nature of extreme self-lovers, as they will set a house ablaze, and it would be merely to roast their eggs…those that (as Cicero says of Pompey) are sui amantes sine rivali…lovers of themselves without rivals’.[7]
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Byron utilized the same expression, articulating how, “Self-love for ever creeps out, like a serpent, to sting anything which happens…to stumble on it.”[8] Meanwhile, Baudelaire remarked of ‘as vigorous a growth in the heart of natural man as self-love’, as well as of those who ‘like Narcissuses of fat-headedness…are contemplating the crowd, as though it were a river, offering them their own image’.[9]
By mid-century, however, egotism was perhaps an equally prevalent term for self-absorption: ‘egotists…made acutely aware of a self, by the suffering in which it dwells’[10]—though still with ‘curious suggestions of the Narcissus tale’[11] in the background.
At the end of the century, the term as we recognize it finally appeared, with Havelock Ellis, the English sexologist, drafting a short document in 1927 regarding its origin, where he ‘argued that the priority should indeed be split between himself and Paul Näcke, explaining that the term “narcissus-like” had been applied by him in 1898 as a description of a psychological state, and that Näcke in 1899 had introduced the term Narcismus to denote a sexual perversion’.[12]
In 1911, Otto Rank released the first psychoanalytical article that was particularly concentrated on narcissism, connecting it to vanity and self-admiration.[13]
Freud
Overview
According to Ernest Jones, in 1909 Freud proclaimed that “narcissism was a crucial intermediary stage between auto-erotism and object-love”.[14] The subsequent year in his “Leonardo” he described publicly for the first time how “the developing young individual…finds his love objects on the path of narcissism, since Greek myths label a youth Narcissus, whom nothing pleased so much as his own mirrored image”.[15] Although Freud only issued one paper solely dedicated to narcissism, titled On Narcissism: An Introduction[16] (1914), the notion gained an increasingly pivotal role in his ideology.[17]
Primary Narcissism
Freud proposed that exclusive self-love may not be as sinful as previously presumed and might actually be a common element in the human psyche. He contended that narcissism “is the libidinal counterpart to the egoism of the instinct of self-preservation.” He termed this primary narcissism.[16]
Freud asserted that individuals are born without a sense of selves as distinct beings, or ego. The ego develops throughout infancy and early childhood when the external world, often in the shape of parental communication, definitions, and anticipations, intrudes upon primary narcissism, educating the individual about the nature of their social environment, from which the ego ideal, an image of the perfect self that the ego should strive toward, can be constructed. “As it grew, the ego distanced itself from primary narcissism, fashioned an ego-ideal, and proceeded to channel energy toward various objects”.[18]
Freud viewed all libidinous impulses as fundamentally sexual and suggested that ego libido (libido directed inward toward the self) cannot always be distinctly separated from object-libido (libido directed toward people or objects outside oneself).
SecondaryNarcissism
Freud posited that secondary narcissism arises when libido is retracted from external objects, primarily the mother, resulting in a connection to social reality that encompasses the possibility of megalomania. “This megalomania undoubtedly comes into existence at the cost of object-libido….This leads us to view the narcissism generated by the engagement of object-cathexes as a secondary form, layered upon a primary narcissism”.[19] For Freud, despite both primary and secondary narcissism arising during typical human advancement, difficulties making the transition from one to the other can result in abnormal narcissistic conditions in later life.
According to Freud, “This condition of secondary narcissism established object relations of a narcissistic nature.” He elaborated on this further in Mourning and Melancholia—regarded as one of Freud’s most significant contributions to object relations theory, clarifying the overall tenets of object relations and narcissism as constructs.[20]
Narcissism, Relationships, and Self-Worth
Freud asserted that to care for another is to convert ego-libido into object-libido through bestowing self-love upon someone else, which diminishes ego-libido available for primary narcissism and safeguarding the self. Any inability to maintain this balance or disruption results in psychological disturbances. In such situations, primary narcissism can only be revived by withdrawing object-libido (also known as object-love) to replenish the ego-libido.
Subsequent Psychoanalysts
Karen Horney
Karen Horney perceived narcissism considerably differently than Freud, Kohut, and other conventional psychoanalytic thinkers, as she did not propose a primary narcissism but regarded the narcissistic personality as a result of a particular kind of early environment influencing a specific type of temperament. For her, narcissistic desires and tendencies are not innate to human nature.
Horney considered narcissism distinct from her other principal defensive strategies or resolutions in that it is not compensatory. While self-idealization serves as compensatory in her framework, it differentiates itself from narcissism. All defensive strategies encompass self-idealization, but in the narcissistic approach, it tends to arise from indulgence rather than deprivation. However, the narcissist’s self-esteem remains fragile, as it is not grounded in genuine achievements.[21]
Heinz Kohut
Heinz Kohut delved deeper into the ramifications of Freud’s viewpoint on narcissism. He argued that a child is likely to fantasize about possessing a grandiose self and ideal caregivers. He asserted that deep inside, all individuals maintain a belief in their own perfection and that of anything they are attached to. As an individual develops, grandiosity transitions into self-esteem, with the idealization of the caregiver setting the stage for core values. It is when psychological trauma disrupts this progression that the most primitive and narcissistic version of the self remains intact. Kohut designated these conditions as narcissistic personality disorder, characterized by ‘the merging and detaching from an archaic self-object playing a central role…narcissistic union with the idealized self-object’.[22]
Kohut proposed that narcissism is part of a developmental phase during which caregivers offer a robust and protective presence with which the child can identify, reinforcing the child’s burgeoning sense of self through mirroring their positive attributes. If caregivers inadequately meet their child’s needs, the child develops a brittle and flawed sense of self.[23] ‘Kohut’s cutting-edge assertion…became a genuine manifesto in the United States….The era of “normal narcissism” had commenced’[24]
Kohut also extended his gaze beyond the destructive and pathological elements of narcissism, believing it contributes to the cultivation of resilience, ideals, and ambition once transformed by life experiences or analysis[25]—though detractors contended that his theory on how ‘we attach to ideals and values instead of our archaic selves…suits the individual who escapes negative inner states into idealized external objects’.[26]
Otto F. Kernberg
Otto Kernberg employs the term narcissism to refer to the function of self in managing self-esteem.
He maintained that normal, infantile narcissism relies on external affirmation and the acquisition of desirable and attractive objects, which should subsequently evolve into robust, mature self-esteem. This healthy narcissism depends on a cohesive sense of self that encompasses images of internalized affirmation from those close to the individual, regulated by the superego and ego ideal—internal mental frameworks assuring the individual of their worth and that they merit their own respect.
The failure of infantile narcissism to evolve into this healthy adult form results in a pathology.[27]
Object Relations Theory
‘Melanie Klein’s…depictions of infantile omnipotence and megalomania offered significant insights into the clinical understanding of narcissistic conditions. In 1963, while writing about the psychopathology of narcissism, Herbert Rosenfeld was particularly focused on arriving at a clearer definition of object relationships and their associated defense mechanisms within narcissism’.[28]
D. W. Winnicott’s insightful observations of the mother-child relationship also illuminate primary narcissism, which in the young child can be viewed as an extension of the mother’s narcissism.[28]
Jacques Lacan
Lacan—expanding on Freud’s assertion that “all narcissistic urges operate from the ego and have their permanent residency in the ego”[29]—utilized his concept of the mirror stage to examine the narcissistic ego regarding “the fundamental structure it derives from its connection to the reflective image…narcissism”.[30]
‘Béla Grunberger emphasized the dual orientation of narcissism—as both a need for self-affirmation and a tendency to restore enduring dependency. The continual presence of narcissism throughout life led Grunberger to propose treating it as an autonomous factor (1971)’.[28]
‘Under the evocative title Life Narcissism, Death Narcissism (1983), André Green elucidated the conflict surrounding the object of narcissism (whether a fantasy object or a real entity) in relation to the ego. According to Green, it is due to narcissism providing the ego with a certain degree of autonomy…that a destructive form of narcissism warrants consideration, as the object is obliterated at the onset of this process’; while in an additional analysis, ‘Green brings forth physical narcissism, intellectual narcissism, with further inquiries into …’.
and ethical narcissism’[28]—a classification occasionally distilled into that between ‘somatic narcissists who are fixated on the physical body…[&] cerebral narcissists—individuals who enhance their sense of grandeur from an inherent feeling of intellectual dominance’.[31]
Psychiatry
Narcissistic personality disorder is a diagnosis outlined in DSM-5, established by the American Psychiatric Association.[32]
The International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th Edition (ICD-10), published by the World Health Organization (WHO), categorizes narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) under “Other specific personality disorders”.[33] The ICD-11, expected to be implemented on 1 January 2022, will consolidate all personality disorders into a singular category, which can be classified as “Mild”, “Moderate” or “Severe”.
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