French Literature Reviews - 2026
A. Phillips, Unforbidden Pleasures
Philosophy, Anthropology and Ideas
Bibliographic reference: Adam Phillips, Les plaisirs non défendus [Unforbidden Pleasures], Paris: Gallimard, coll. Connaissance de l'Inconscient, 2018.
176 pages
ISBN: 9782070179121
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“We recognize in the child a natural goodness, a desire to forget oneself, to lose self-interest, to become absorbed in something else. And the extraordinary vitality of their desire: at once an enthusiastic, playful hedonism, and a certain hardness. The child possesses an openness to the world that growing up puts at risk. In growing up, natural innocence is replaced by an unoriginal sin.
The intensity of childhood's allowed pleasures is taken up in the Freudian works of Winnicott and Marion Milner. What Winnicott initiated with his concept of play, Marion Milner elaborated in terms of the child's capacity for absorption. In her work, the forbidden and allowed pleasures of childhood were seen as inextricable, mutually stimulating, and never mutually exclusive. For her, pathology implied a split between the forbidden and the allowed.”
Inspired by great literature as well as the inventive authors of psychoanalysis, Adam Phillips' original thought offers, in clear strokes, a modern, demanding psychoanalytic ethic that is a delight to the intellect.
Adam Phillips operates at the intersection of psychoanalysis and literary essay, drawing frequently on major literary figures alongside clinical pioneers like D.W. Winnicott and Marion Milner. This tradition of psychoanalytic thought bridges the gap between rigorous clinical observation and broader cultural inquiry, engaging deeply with the humanities. By examining how emotional vitality and spontaneous absorption are curtailed by conventional upbringing, the text aligns with twentieth-century intellectual efforts to rethink psychic health not merely as the absence of pathology, but as a capacity for authentic engagement and imaginative freedom.
This accessible yet intellectually demanding work will appeal to readers interested in psychoanalytic theory, modern intellectual history, and the philosophy of mind. It addresses fundamental questions regarding how individuals navigate internalized prohibitions and recover a sense of uninhibited vitality. Scholars and general readers alike, particularly those familiar with the Tavistock tradition or the French psychoanalytic milieu represented by the Connaissance de l'Inconscient series, will find it a stimulating contribution to contemporary discussions on ethics, desire, and the human capacity for play.