I have very little knowledge of Lacan and cannot comment seriously on him, but observe this:
Between man and love, there is woman; between man and woman, there is a world; betwen man and the world, there is a wall. What is at stake in a serious love relationship between a man and a woman is castration. Castration is the means of adaptation to survival.
— Le séminaire, Livre XX: Encore. Paris: Seuil, 1975.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
Is Jack lackin’?
I got asthma
This reminds me of those suspect items on the standardized exams: blank is to blank as blank is to blank.
My response: blankety-blank-blank (as in some kind of expletive). ;^)
i read this and said – WOW – out loud…
was he meaning male castration or female or both?
i keep re-reading this…wow
going to the link now…he should watch ‘the fountain’
and my last thought — have you seen ‘the trap’???
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trap_(television_documentary_series)
they talk about this very thing in it…
Joanna – probably. Andy – it does make one want to hyperventilate! CS – reduction to formula, good point. Azgoddess – that was my reaction, although I haven’t seen “The Fountain” or “The Trap” – and surely should.
I used to be able to explain Lacan basics, although I hadn’t really read Lacan. Now I am rusty. Female castration, yes it’s about that too, in that women don’t have the metaphorical phallus. They are in a state of lack and are trying to get one. The phallus, which he keeps saying is not physical, has to do if I remember correctly with authority, meaning, self-presence, and things like that.
Your comment, Azg, caused me to think a little more about Lacan, and I wrote some more over here: http://sptc.wordpress.com/2007/06/05/should-we-re-study-lacan/
But the reason I put up the quotation when I came across it was that it reminded me so much of what that Whiteman who wants me in a friends-with-benefits relationship says: true love relationships are castrating. Which makes me think that “between men and the world there is a wall.”
I know of two people who talk non-stop of Lacan, however, nothing is ever really said other than “as Lacan says” or “Like Lacan,” and that mirror image rubbish that I think can be explained more expediently by simply saying “when a child realizes he or she is no longer his or her caregiver.” End of story.
Nevertheless, funny story (at least to me anyway because I know the two players) the two that I mentioned above as the only two I know who mention Lacan all the time is quite funny to watch when they talk to (or I should say talk at) each other. The one begins babbling on about something, always, ALWAYS ending up throwing in Nietzsche, even though the conversation began with Lacan, and the second interlocutor picks up where the first leaves off, babbling on some more, not concluding until the first interrupts and tells the second that she is in need of brushing up her knowledge of Lacan. Meanwhile, I entertain myself with thoughts of an International Philosophy Match that I saw once and cannot stop laughing about it while simultaneously mentally punishing myself for eating an entire bag of microwavable popcorn.
Kitty – I know!!! LOL!!! It is to some extent because of people like that that that I cannot take certain theorists and philosophers seriously – no matter how useful some of their ideas might be.
This little quotation has really stuck with me over the past week. (OMG guess why?) But anyhow the first part of it:
“Between man and love, there is woman; between man and woman, there is a world; between man and the world, there is a wall.”
That seemed to make some kind of not-completely-shallow sense to me at the time. But I couldn’t fit the castration talk go along with that.
But if I just plug in “sex” for the word “love,” then the whole thing flows, the castration-theorizing becomes castration-whining, and the whole thing just sounds like a certain kind of guy-talk beer-conversation that would have me looking desperately at my watch. But it does hang together then.
So is that all he means? Why write books then? The other guys ditch him at the bar or something?
Tom – ROFL (I think that means rolling on the floor laughing)! If only the professors we had in graduate school, some of whom took Lacan ultra-seriously, realized that, they would be so … uh … castrated?! 😉