You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
Architectural critics often express their displeasure over the appearance of new buildings by saying that they look like “the work of a committee. “This book, a companion piece to The Glossary of Psychoanalytic Terms and Concepts, first published in 1967 and updated as Psychoanalytic Terms and Concepts in 1990, refutes that cliché. And well it should, for it was assembled by the same editors and editorial board that “planned the second book to provide a more comprehensive discussion of subjects of central importance in psychoanalysis, including its applications, technical aspects, clinical phenomena, and more general theoretical concepts.“More than a committee, this group of editors and authors constitutes the core of mainstream American psychoanalysis, the one exception being our Toronto colleague Charles Hanly. Understandably, given its august source, this book has already been incorporated into the curriculum of American institutes, Topeka included, as well as our own.
In reflection on my own extensive exposure to the multiple streams of psychoanalysis, its teaching and practice, and the diversity among our working colleagues, I expect that there will be a variety of responses to this book. My concern is that younger colleagues, some of whom appear to be more interested in selfpsychology or certain of the object relations theories, may reject the contents of this book as being” mere metapsychology.” Lacking the intense classical training of their seniors, they may not appreciate the opportunity to build and develop a conceptual platform in the basic elements of psychoanalytic theory which this book so systematically and thoroughly presents.
As you might expect then, such strong medicine as is contained here can have significant side effects. For me it was an attack of nostalgia based on a career-long unfulfilled desire for a true psychoanalytic textbook, which became more acute when I left the Rapaport-saturated Topeka Institute for practice in Toronto. Here, altho