The Technique of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy. Volume I

By R. J. Langs. New York: Jason Aronson. 1973. Pp. 659.

The Technique of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy. Volume II. By R. J. Langs. New York: Jason Aronson. 1974. Pp. 552.

Langs has provided us in this compendious two-volume work a significant and valuable contribution to the literature on psychotherapy as based on and derived from psychoanalytic principles. The work is intended as an introductory treatise and therefore would be of value to those who are beginning the study of psychoanalytic psychotherapy and for those who are continuing to perfect their knowledge and grasp of psychoanalytic principles in applying them to psychotherapeutic contexts. The primary value of Langs's work is that it provides a clear, comprehensive, systematic and theoretically consistent approach to the application of psychoanalytic principles in psychotherapy. There have been few sources to which the psychotherapy supervisor could refer his students prior to this that offer anywhere near the comprehensiveness and systematic presentation of analytic ideas for the psychotherapist as these volumes. But even more experienced clinicians may find Langs's clear, concise, and often illuminating discussions helpful in putting principles of psychoanalytic psychotherapy in perspective.

Langs's treatment is systematically organized to cover the fundamental aspects of the psychotherapy situation. The first volume deals with the initial contact with the patient and then goes on to a discussion of the theoretical framework which provides the basis for psychotherapeutic interventions. He then discusses the problems related to understanding the patient's communications and then considers at some length the nature and quality of the therapist's interventions. The second volume takes up the patient's responses to such therapeutic interventions and then considers various aspects of the psychotherapeutic relationship, including the varieties of transference, alliance and countertransference. The