Mourning and its Relation to Manic-Depressive States

Melanie Klein's 1940 paper in the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis connects normal mourning with the depressive position of infancy. The mourner, she argues, passes through a modified and transitory manic-depressive state and comes out of it. An actual loss revives the early fear of having lost the loved internal objects, and the work of mourning rebuilds the inner world by reinstating them. The infantile depressive position finds expression in the infantile neurosis, through which it is worked through and gradually overcome. The paper also elaborates the manic defences, among them triumph, control and contempt.