Lois Munro 1907–1973

Dr Lois Mary Munro was born on 13th July 1907. She obtained the medical qualifications of M.B., B.S. (Lond.) and M.R.C.S. (Eng.) L.R.C.P. (Lond.) in 1931 at the London School of Medicine for Women and was a Founder Member of the Royal College of Psychiatry in 1971. She qualified as an Associate Member of the British Society of Psychoanalysis in 1948, becoming a Member in 1951. From 1960 to 1969, she served as the Director of the London Clinic of Psychoanalysis, and at the time of her death on 2nd December 1973, was the Hon. Treasurer of the European Psycho-Analytical Federation.

Several American friends who wrote to me about Lois, shocked, dazed, bewildered as we all were when the dreadful news reached us, stressed her sense of humour. In letters written by very different persons this same remark recurred about Lois's gaiety: what fun she was, how enterprising. They were so incredulous because they simply could not connect the idea of death with Lois.

They are right. Lois had a strong sense of humour, and I could quote many instances that made it fun to be with her. She also had the gift of the apt phrase, and she enjoyed this as much as did her audience. Such phrases formed memory symbols for shared past experiences, milestones in journeys recalled. One can add to this her rich imagination and understand why she was a story teller par excellence.

Yet, important though her sense of humour was, it was secondary to other and greater gifts: intuition and empathy. She could often grasp the essence of a person's behaviour, character and problems at once and convey this impressively. Thanks to these qualities she was an unusually sensitive therapist and teacher and very courageous in accepting difficult patients.

She nurtured such intuitive knowledge and refined it by turning to the source which, from time immemorial, has provided understanding of human nature—works of art, in particular visual and literary. She was a great reader of psyc