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Bion: I continue where we left off, considering the problem of giving the patient an interpretation which is addressed to a particular aspect of his statement. We listen to the statement, but we also observe what we consider to be the personality. I don't know how we could satisfy a scientist who asked, “What is a personality?” It is not very satisfactory to look up the word in a dictionary.
I recall a patient who talked freely and easily; he said that he didn't have dreams and that he had no imagination. For month after month he came to every session, never failed, never had an illness, never caught cold. When he got onto the couch he seemed to have some difficulty about which I did not bother much because it appeared to be simply a question of adjusting his clothes and his comfort. But after about three months I began to think this was very peculiar.
He always lay in a slightly awkward position on the couch; he would lie flat and then raise his head as if he were struggling against some sort of opposition and trying to see his feet. He did that three or four times. I had no idea what he was doing or even how to tell myself what this peculiar movement was. He was so co-operative, so rational, and I was kept very well informed. He said that he only slept an hour or two each night and worked for about sixteen hours a day, seven days a week. There were no complaints when I took a break or at week-ends; no disturbance, no depression, whereas with other patients I am used to some kind of reaction to the fact that I am stopping.
I thought I would change my vertex because I could not see anything very much from where I was observing the patient. When I did that, it occurred to me that his precise and exact position on the couch could be comprehensible if he were lying on the edge of a precipice.
And then his posture began to look like a cataleptic attitude. Indeed, the whole analysis began to look like a compulsive ritual – the same hour, the same behaviour, no diversion