Autismes De L'enfance [Childhood Autisms]. : Edited by R. Perron and D. Ribas. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, Monographies de la Revue Française de Psychanalyse. 1994. Pp. 156.

This Revue Française de Psychanalyse monograph contains the contributions of eight psychoanalysts to the understanding of autism. Chiland and Lebovici deplore the polemics concerning the origins of this pathology and emphasise the importance of a number of factors, such as the consideration of early interactions and early diagnosis. Hochmann comments on Kanner's pioneering paper before discussing the role of the mother's reverie as

a ‘metaphorising agency’ for the baby and its transformations in autistic pathology. Athanassiou, Haag and Bégoin enrich the theories of Bick, Tustin and Meltzer with their personal views. Perron notes that, for all their diversity, infantile psychoses and autism have two common features, namely anxiety and the failure of fantasy structuring. Finally, Ribas uses Freud's metapsychology to attempt a metapsychological classification of recent theories about autism, drawing also on his own experience. The book presents a wide range of contemporary psychoanalytic theories on autistic pathology without any aetiological or pathogenic bias of its own.