CORY REYNOLDS | DATE 4/11/2012

Louise Bourgeois: Return of the Repressed

We are pleased to present an excerpt from Violette Editions' extraordinary forthcoming collection of Louise Bourgeois' psychoanalytic writings, The Return of the Repressed. Below is a reproduction from the book (LB-0128, loose sheet, April 24, 1952, 8 1/2 x 11 inches) followed by a later writing transcribed from an undated 13.5 x 10-inch drawing.

c. 1960

Dawn breaks on a battle
field – The calm after the storm
Dawn breaks after the night
Daylight peers through the curtains after a hellish night
Of guilt – The eyes open slowly and dare to see
this is what tries to come out in the drawing.
it pushes towards realization of dawn –
at the grande chaumière1 there is no more guilt because there is
no more sex
In the love lesson in a park – they are
unabashed peeping Toms, hence their health –
after this guilt attack also desire to repair
to tidy up – to be torn between 2 guilts towards the

father towards the husband – this can be “achieved”
only if the person is loved + approved of by the
father + the husband.
the father should say you are a good wife – The hus
band should say you are a good daughter of a
good father – because how can I love a father who make some sense –
Guilt makes one stray
Afield. hitting blindly
right + left like a
bird hitting the bars
of its cage – the cage simply becomes bigger but
it’s still
a cage
I would like
order a bit of precision, a bit of purpose a [bit] of cleanliness instead of evasion
evasion makes me ever more nervous I don’t believe in it. I
want to go back to darkness and warmth – to bed –

Above: Bourgeois with her father, Louis, at Leon & Eddie’s Restaurant, New York, 1948.
Photograph is reproduced from The Return of the Repressed.