phantasy

phantasy (countable and uncountable, plural phantasies)

1. Dated form of fantasy.
   • 1931 November–December, H. P. Lovecraft, The Shadow Over Innsmouth:

     […] what man has hitherto known only in febrile phantasy and tenuous legend?

2. (psychology) The innate, mental image of an object; the link between instinct and reality.
   • 1987, Juliet Mitchell, “Introduction”, in Selected Melanie Klein, →ISBN, page 22:

     By later Kleinians and critics alike, phantasy is often seen as identical to Freud's concept of psychic reality.

   • 2013, Lene Austed, quoting Jonathan Davidoff, “Introducing Psychoanalysis and Politics”, in Nationalism and the Body Politic, →ISBN, page 262:

     However, Klein's phantasy is not exactly Lacan's imaginary fantasy; it is, I think, more than that.

In psychological writing, the spelling phantasy is often used to differentiate the Kleinian concept, which represents an innate unconscious process, from the related Freudian concept fantasy, which is conscious and deliberate.[1]