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DR. KLENBORT DESERVES OUR APPRECIATION for once more addressing one of the most provocative and controversial of Sullivan's concepts. Students of Interpersonal Theory perennially have difficulty defining and differentiating such words as "individual" and "individuality, " "person" and "personality". They struggle to ascertain whether there is indeed uniqueness, and how this is to be understood, studied and used in their therapeutic work. The very title of Sullivan's major essay on this topic, The Illusion of Personal Individuality is often seen as an assaultative attack. This is especially the response of student analysts who, of all people, have dedicated their professional lives to the minute investigation of ideosyncratic experience. Doesn't it deny the validity of one's whole career to give up the idea that each patient is fundamentally unique? Sullivan certainly did not think so, but many others have found it impossible to agree with him.
While professing to simply reexamine Sullivan's thinking on these issues, Dr. Klenbort does finally declare her disagreement