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Fred Pine is a clinical psychologist with over sixty years in the practice of psychoanalysis. In this memoir, Fred attempts to bring the many facets of a well-lived life together to inform the trajectory of his work—to identify the shaping influences and their impact. Fred's account of his deep and abiding engagement with analytic theory and practice is inspirational, and I would argue that Fred himself is an exemplary figure in the history of psychoanalysis.
It will take you only a few sentences to perceive the candid and open style of this memoir, which immediately invites the reader into a personal relationship with Fred Pine, the person. Consider this opening:
The work of psychotherapists and psychoanalysts is deeply influenced by their character and personality, as well as their overt life experiences. Since I can best illustrate this with the case I know best, myself, this will be a very personal paper. I give myself permission to write it because it is a subject not often written about in spite of its obvious importance. In the very month of my retirement after sixty-six years of practice and after receiving a diagnosis of terminal cancer, I find myself thinking about the evolution of the way I work [p. 945].
Fred is letting us know that he is going to use his astute analytic eye to interrogate his own attraction to psychoanalysis, sharing childhood determinants, as well as, surprisingly, the role of Tourette's syndrome in influencing his career direction. As you will see, he does not stop there. By paper's end, we have been invited to accompany him in the complex process of closing his practice after his terminal diagnosis. Here we see a courageous and deeply connected man who has been able to put the needs of his patients first, even as mortality is nipping at his heels.