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Steven H. Cooper's The Analyst's Experience of the Depressive Position: The Melancholic Errand of Psychoanalysis is an important and captivating read. Through his presentation of vivid case material and the theoretical issues these cases illuminate, the author highlights vitally important issues relating to pluralism in contemporary psychoanalysis and demonstrates how these issues will affect the future of psychoanalytic theory and technique. According to Cooper, no version of psychoanalysis provides a unique theoretical panacea that might solve all the clinical dilemmas of modern practice. Further, the majority of clinical problems can be justifiably formulated from different theoretical systems and most contemporary analytic practice is probably based on hybrid theory. Cooper demonstrates this phenomenon in his own work, which conveys the interplay of different traditions. He primarily explores American relational theory, the Kleinian approach, and the Independent tradition, asking all the while: is it really possible to amalgamate concepts from these different traditions? If so, how is it accomplished?
For Cooper, the key to moving beyond pluralism is the adoption of the depressive position. Although he takes this concept from the Kleinian school, his focus is not in examining the Kleinian conception of the depressive position and its complex relation with aggression, reparation, etc. Rather, he suggests that it is the acceptance of loss of the ideal that is essential for any umbrella theory of the analytic process. Poignantly,
he points to the inevitable incompleteness of our theories and the limits of our desire to heal, and, most important, to our ultimate limitation as analysts by dint of our humanness. This is similar to the Lacanian notion of “manque à être,” a lack in being. As the title of the book suggests, accepting the experience of the depressive position on a personal level necessitates its generalization to “the melancholic errand of psychoanalysi