The Imaginal Elf
The imaginary Companion hovers like a star at the margins of psychoanalytic casework; present but distant, usually benevolent and benign. Depending on what analyst you read, as many as a third to nearly all children conjure and name one or more fantastic entities with which they form a durable relationship for a period of time before discarding into childhood amnesia. In the interests of readability we will refer to the imaginary companion as the elf. The elf is a projection spanning from fantasy to reality. Like Winnicott’s transitional object, the elf functions as an aid to social individuation located after the rapprochement period of disentanglement from the parent, from two and half years on; the elf is a defense against a terrifying world. The form of the elf is various and imaginative, from animals, to monsters, to humanoids, to your own fantastic twin uncorrupted by the horrors of life—see Frida Kahlo. Oftentimes the child may imagine a squad of elves. The elf has a vivid presence, both seen and heard. Interactions are elaborate; the child projects agency into the elf so that it seems to have a mind of its own; the elf frustrates the child.
Some elves are never really discarded but may be called upon, throughout life, in moments of extreme loneliness or distress. Certain analysts note that the elf of childhood remains a continual real presence throughout the lives of many perfectly sober, and “sane” individuals—see Fernando Pessoa. Rarely does the elf come into the consulting room, nor bear upon the analysis: From many analysts’ perspective, the elf is benign, indifferent to the treatment. The elf does not indicate any kind of psychosis or pre-psychosis; psychotic children typically do not project an elf. Nor does the elf reveal any special genius: the child’s super-abundant imagination forms a continuous circuit with their reality. It may be the case that the presence of mediated fictional worlds—be they storytelling, television or reading—will limit or make unnecessary the projection of the elf. The elf that is projected by twins, or more than one child, is a remarkable and understudied phenomena; the vivid presence of the elf is shared, weirdly seen by both children at once—a mutual telepathic fantasy.
The malevolent elf is rather more ambivalent within the psychoanalytic literature linked as it is to an early presence of toxic superego: an animated shard of the parent’s disturbed psyche, if not a projection of the child’s own animus. The malevolent elf may function also as scapegoat: the child will blame their deviant behavior upon the instigation, or agency of the wicked elf—see Kurt Cobain’s Boddah, to whom he addressed his suicide letter. The elf of childhood has often been stigmatized as disturbed, or even demonic; the clairvoyant Tony who lives in Danny’s finger in The Shining is one example of this stigma; the projection of the elf is the shining; less demonic than a result of childhood trauma…
