You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
Bion's latest book is different from everything he has written before. The reason is very simple; this book has never been written. It is a spoken book in spite of the efforts to change the spoken words to print. The title itself is somewhat misleading, since the volume does not contain formal lectures. They are seminars given to colleagues in Sao Paulo at Easter, 1973, and the book consists of edited tape-recordings of the eight evenings when Bion spoke to them. It is good that the character of the spoken word has not been lost. The reader is listening to conversations with Bion. His audience asks questions like these: 'Can the ideogram be considered as a non-verbal communication?' or 'How would you consider the negative capability of the analyst in relation to the so-called repetition compulsion?' These questions, each in its own right, are interesting enough, but reading them one after another, one has a feeling of unreality. The audience seems to have studied their Bion carefully and uses the opportunity to question him on points about which they wish to receive further information. This seems to be justifiable to the student of Bion's thought and the value of the book is Bion's commentary on details of his work. But I was puzzled why I had difficulties reading the book, at least in the beginning. I think I know the reason, which I shall give later on.
Some of the evenings are introduced by Bion with a short opening talk. The first evening starts with the story of the robbers of the Royal Cemetary at Ur and their courage to penetrate the realm of the Unknown and of Taboo—the precursor of scientific research—which Bion compares with psychoanalysis as 'one of the rare situations in which human beings can be engaged in a frightening occupation without even going outside the door'. This opens a discussion of the present, past and future as realities in the analytical intercourse between patient and analyst. Bion says many interesting things because h