Psychoanalysis and revolution in Latin America: Marie Langer interviewed by Arturo Varchevker*

Arturo Varchevker (AV): I have reread Cuestionamos [1971, 1973] and it made me remember very important years in Argentinian politics and the psychoanalytic movement there. So my first question will be: Why Cuestionamos, for you?

Marie Langer (ML): As I say in the Prologue to Cuestionamos, the idea came to me when initially a paper I presented at the APA was not published in their journal, though it's in the APA records. In a way it was with this paper that I left the APA — a strange piece of work! But prior to this I had already returned to active politics. I had a very strange feeling about writing this paper, called ‘Psychoanalysis and/or social revolution’. It was like a driving force inside me. It's as if it had worked as a total statement for myself. It took me out of the APA, along with the whole Plataforma Group, out of my ordinary life, and finally to Nicaragua.

AV: When you presented the paper, did Plataforma already exist?

ML: Yes, Plataforma had already been formed in Rome, at the time of the International Psychoanalytical Congress in 1969. Afterwards, in a rather confused manner, a Plataforma list was made; people put their names on it, then the list disappeared …

AV: A part of the psychoanalytic world was expressing some unease. What is your view of that period? And is this a prologue to Cuestionamos?

ML: Plataforma had its beginnings, in fact, in Zurich. It existed for quite some time there, where it was possible because some training analysts were tolerant, flexible and progressive. There was something of Plataforma in Vienna, but not much, and it didn't last; there was also something in Bologna. This was 1969, after 1968, which was a very important year in Europe.

AV: This means that the student movement in France, Germany and Italy had a part to play in this.

ML: Yes, all of that came into it. And precisely in 19