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The question of the ideal is regularly encountered in the collective and individual realms. It has to do with identifications and can be enmeshed in the network of extreme representations. It is the product of narcissism and sets itself up in a more or less antagonistic position in relation to conflict, to the superego and castration. It necessarily finds itself implicated through its links with desire and interdicts, that is, with life drives and defenses which make it possible to treat its effects. Using fiction, myths and other forms of literature and their interactions with metapsychology, the author analyses various figures of the feminine ideal. She also presents a clinical study which considers narcissism and its connections with the ideal and its derivatives.