The notion of acute psychosis as envisaged by psychiatry is situated on the border of psychoanalysis. The acute psychoses, sudden and severe disorganizations of the mind, all have in common a disturbance of the relational faculties, a loss of contact with what is commonly accepted as reality, and a diminishing or absence of critical abilities with regard to the pathological.

There are multiple different forms of acute psychosis. Among these are melancholic and manic episodes, which can clinically exist in alternation (hence the framework of manic-depressive psychosis) and which are associated with Freud's writings on the "narcissistic neuroses"; acute delusional psychoses, some of which are linked to the development of chronic psychosis; and finally, dream-confusion disorders, for which the possibility of an organic etiology must always be investigated. As varied as they are, these disorders all have in common the temporal...