Commentary

We have not yet developed a generally accepted and convincing method of writing about our clinical work that would allow us to reveal it to colleagues or show others the unique and powerful treatment that is psychoanalysis. We have not often found an effective method of translation from the familiar, private oral mode in which the analysis takes place into the more public written mode while yet retaining the “music” of the analytic interaction. Robert Michels addresses some of these difficulties in his comprehensive “history of the case history.” He reviews and examines the historical, political, and dynamic forces that have shaped and impeded the development of the analytic case report.

Michels's central thesis concerns what he calls “intention” in case histories. That is, he believes that case reports are written in a certain context, for a particular purpose, and that this purpose is revealed in the text either explicitly or implicitly. Michels would like writers to become aware of these intentions and to share them more openly with readers, because he believes that such candor will shed light on the analyst and on the analytic process.

In an effort to frame his thesis—that we can read to greater advantage by observing the context or the analyst's intention in writing a case history—Michels contrasts two views of how clinical material should be reported. He cites the recommendation of the Committee on Certification that the report should be “a narrative of what happened in the analysis, how you helped this happen, and how you understand how this occurred,” and that this can be done with “short quotes,