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Countertransference has been, and continues to be, one of the most controversial concepts in psychoanalytic theory. Michael Gorkin, who received his analytic training through the Adelphi University Post-doctoral Program, has written an accessible account of what he describes as the practical uses of countertransference.
Gorkin starts his book by offering a succinct review of the theoretical literature on the subject. Freud, Ferenczi, Sullivan, the British School
of Object Relations, and other psychoanalytic authors are mentioned in this summary. Gorkin places himself on the side of those authors who use the concept of countertransference in a ‘totalistic fashion’. He says:
… I use the term … to apply to all of the therapist's responses to the patient. But what is of primary interest to me is that type of response which is the counterpart, or expectable, response to the patient's personality and behaviour in the analytic session. Others have called this objective countertransference, and I concur. I distinguish this type of countertransference from the kind of response that is due to the analyst's personal conflicts or idiosyncrasies — sometimes called subjective countertransference.
The author devotes his second chapter to a brief study of Freud's possible countertransference in connection with Ann Lichtein, the subject of ‘The Irma Injection Dream’. Gorkin then moves on to explore the issue of ‘Countertransference as a Source of Information’ for the understanding of the patient. This includes a brief review of projective identification and related phenomena (not only through the work of Melanie Klein and some of her followers but also of other authors: Searles, Langs, Odgen, etc.); a discussion of the phenomena of role-responsiveness (Sandler); and of countertransference neurosis (Racker). Gorkin concludes with a meditation on the psychology of the analyst ‘with particular focus on the personal qualities and early life experiences that seem to predispose the analyst