MONNIELLO GIANLUIGI :THE FEMALE PUBERTARY AND THE FATHER’S GAZE

The female pubertary is composed of the new things that surprise every adolescent girl at the time of the first menses, not only in her body but also and above all in her psychical life. This complex psychical process explores, among other things, the quality of the father’s gaze which follows the evolution of the organization of genital sexuality in his adolescent daughter. This work deals with a rather neglected aspect of the relation between daughter and father. In the analytic treatment of adolescents weak fathers, absent or even violent,can often be the object of huge protective movements and positive judgments on the part of their daughters, who’ll do anything to place the paternal image on a pedestal. In these cases, the Œdipal father seems to have to be kept alive and promoted in order to fulfil his function sufficiently. Indeed, it is only under such conditions that the parricidal fantasy may be fully recognized, its symbolic value fully elaborated, and the Œdipal father can disappear over the horizon.