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I have been a fan of Tom Ogden's writing for a long time. I chose Ogden's (1997) clinical article, “Reverie and Interpretation,” to show psychoanalytic candidates how to use themselves in writing about clinical work. I’ve written about Ogden's work (Coen, 2000), expressing my delight that he can be so open with his patient as well as his reader. Perhaps I’ve insisted too much on openness; when I felt that his narration of his patient had became more remote, I felt disappointed. I can feel the same about my own writing.
The Analyst's Ear and the Critic's Eye: Rethinking Psychoanalysis and Literature pairs Tom Ogden, psychoanalyst, with his son, Benjamin, literary scholar. I knew this before I read their book. It is not explicitly stated anywhere in the book; I kept searching to find it. They contrast their approaches to reading and writing about literature. I envy that they can do this. I love and admire my children but none is fully a literary
scholar. What a wonderful opportunity the Ogdens have to think together, to learn from each other, to write collaboratively. I recommend your reading their samples of criticism. Each Ogden reads, thinks, and writes very well about literature. Their critical writing about literature makes this book a pleasure to read. Each one attempts to describe his approach to reading and writing by grounding his method within the aims of his discipline.
The psychoanalyst Ogden decries the heavy-handed application of psychoanalytic theory to criticism. I, of course, agree with this. Long ago many of us were already protesting about it. Instead of forcing psychoanalytic theory onto literary texts, the elder Ogden advises an approach to literature modeled on how psychoanalysts actually engage with their patients. This is lively, interactive, intersubjective, Bionian, transformative; something new comes from the interaction of reader and text just as it does from the psychoanalytic encounter. In 1981 the literary scholar, Meredith Skura, who h