Introductory Remarks

On 26 April 1997 the Lincoln Centre put on its first public conference. It took place in the Montague Chambers of Southwark Cathedral in London. It was a half-day meeting, and there were two speakers: Dr Felicity de Zulueta, whose paper was called ‘Demonology versus Science?’, and Dr Christoph Hering, who spoke on ‘Beyond Understanding? Some Thoughts on the Meaning and Function of the Notion of “Evil”’. The subject of the conference had been suggested by Christoph Hering, when he was still living in England and working for the Lincoln Centre. He believed that psychoanalytic thinking had an important part to play in our understanding of some of the recent violent events against people that we had all been witness to, in the press and on TV - the massacre of schoolchildren at Dunblane, the murder of children by Fred and Rosemary West, to name but two. It seemed appropriate that a year after the Dunblane massacre the Lincoln Centre should come together and try and think about the issues that this event raised, and it seemed fitting that we should come together within the sanctity and safety of Southwark Cathedral. Indeed the quiet seriousness of the Cathedral and its space helped to contain the anxieties that the subject of the conference aroused.

The conference was sold out and it became apparent that the subject was addressing a public need, for people came from a wide range of backgrounds. As a result of the diversity of people's interests there was a richness to the questions and to the exchange, and some creative and healing thinking took place.

The conference was fortunate to have two independent-minded speakers, whose views offered all those present a wide-angled view on the subject. Their differing models of the mind enriched rather than polarized the thinking of everyone. Felicity de Zulueta gave a beautifully argued and researched paper, full of passion and conviction, on Attachment Theory and the links between damaged attachment and human violence. She express