How do you Hold a Moonbeam in your Hand?*: Discussion of the Interview with Edgar Levenson

In this far-ranging interview we are introduced to the complexities and subtleties that characterize the mind and personality of a seminal thinker, a remarkable proselytizer for interpersonal psychoanalysis, who, more than anyone else, has been the poster boy for the William Alanson White Institute. Having this chance to express some of my impressions of and reactions to Edgar Levenson was an opportunity too good to miss. When I was a candidate in the late 1960s, Levenson was the star of the Institute, the most admired writer, the most sought-after supervisor. After I graduated, I found him constantly challenging his colleagues well-formed opinions and forcing us to rethink accepted canon. He elaborated Sullivan's theoretical assumptions, extended his clinical reach, and had the temerity to “analyze” Sullivan himself (Levenson, 1984). And when I became Director of the Institute he was often a welcome ally, but also, on occasion, a provocative reminder of the standards set by my predecessors. He is the unusual psychoanalyst-author who always found time to participate in administrative affairs, bringing his special perspective to the political and social as well as the intellectual life of the Institute. In what follows, I try to touch on these varied roles.

For several decades Ed taught an elective clinical seminar for White Institute candidates. When I took the course, each member was asked to present a problem case, one where the patient was incalcitrant or the analysis was stalled. This was about 1970, before there was much talk about countertransference or appreciation of its power to illuminate ana