Pychotherapy, Myth and Method, An Integrative Approach. By Jan Ehrenwald, M.D. Grune & Stratton, New York, 1966.

This is another book on the topic: “What is it really that works in Psychotherapy?” Its position is close to that of J. Frank who, in Persuasion and Healing, suggests that psychotherapy begins to be effective when it mobilizes patients’ expectations of help. This occurs not only because the therapeutic situation has the suggestive power of a socially approved procedure, but also because the therapist has an inner need to help and believes that he can do so. Within an essentially similar framework. Dr. Ehrenwald formulates his own views on the social role of psychoanalysis and the impact of the psychoanalyst's personality.

The social significance of psychoanalysis, hence its suggestive power, is seen in its being “an effective myth at what at the time of this writing may well be the height of its life cycle.” We are reminded that psychoanalysis is but the most recent in a long chain of comprehensive theories of human motivation and behavior. The preceding ones—today's myths—were “attempts to organize, to bring into coherent patterns man's perception of self and of the outer world in order to obtain a modicum of control over it.” Even though these pre-scientific animistic theories were wrong, they “worked” in their roles as rules of social behavior or rationales for healing. This they did because they were “an assertion of the individual's and the group's will to survive, maintain their social identity and to