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The reader of these detailed clinical studies of the
life history and excellent therapeutic handling of four gravely disturbed children cannot but feel full of admiration for Dr. Bettelheim and his devoted staff. Whether he be a child analyst, psychiatrist, paediatrician, or lay humanitarian, these studies provide the kind of professional knowledge and poignancy which should inspire concerted action. The total number in the world of residential institutions for gravely disturbed children in which therapy is available, other than that of humane and safe guardianship, is very small. Among these few, there are such rarities as the Orthogenic School, Chicago, directed by Dr. Bruno Bettelheim, a psycho-analyst. In describing the four cases, he not only provides instruction in psycho-pathology and psycho-analytic therapy, but also in the dynamics of running such a complex residential establishment. These range from matters such as architectural layout to the intricate psycho-dynamics of teamwork in regard to an individual child patient.
It cannot be too strongly emphasized how scarce is this kind of available information. For its nearest counterpart, we have to go back to Aichhorn's masterpiece Wayward Youth, and thence to the voicing of regret in the matter of the disservice caused by the incorrect use of titles, both in the case of Aichhorn's book and of Dr. Bettelheim's clinical material. The title Wayward Youth is not Aichhorn's but his translator's. It is a free, romanticized rendering of Verwahrloste Jugend, of which the nearest translation is 'Derelict Youth'. To be rendered derelict does not connote waywardness even when it should engender it. So it is that an unfortunate if compelling title misleads the English language reader into supposing that psychopathological conditions as varied as psychosis and traumatic neurosis, which may bring about social maladjustment, including delinquent acts, have been lumped together, instead of differentiated, by Aich