Father Hunger: Explorations with Adults and Children by James Herzog Hillsdale, NJ:  Analytic Press, 2001;  324 pp.

James Herzog has been writing about “father hunger” and the role of the father in modulating the aggressive drive for many years. In his book, Father Hunger: Explorations with Adults and Children, he uses extensive analytic case material alongside accounts of his developmental research and observational studies to expand his earlier work on the subject (Herzog 1980, 1982, 1984, 1993).

While it has become fashionable to substitute the word “caregiver” for “mother” and, therefore, blur the unique contributions of father and mother, Herzog affirms that each parent has a unique function and emphasizes the importance of triadic relationships at all states of development. He postulates that the self-with-father representation is important to the management of the aggressive drive, speculating that the more disruptive play style of the father, when set against the background of safety provided by the mother, may function to protect the child from the effects of overwhelming trauma. He proposes that a self that has accrued from “experience and subsequent representation of self with father, self with mother, and with father and mother together” is “endowed with multiple play mode options and resiliency in the face of overwhelming or underwhelming environmental input” (p. 2).

Herzog begins his explorations with material from the analysis of Michael, a happily married, accomplished academic, and the father of two grown children. Their work together, conducted in two parts separated by 17 years, is the centerpiece of this book. Michael, as a child, suffered severe father hunger, as well as physical trauma, including multiple fractures at the hands of his transiently psychotic father. Now, his strenuous gym workouts cause him to re-experience physical pain in his shoulder and hip. He also has homoerotic fantasies and an interest in spanking, though he has never been spanked or ever spanked anyone.