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The Revue Française de Psychanalyse was created in 1927 with participation and financial support from Marie Bonaparte. Each volume is organized around a theme and opens with an ‘argument’ written by an editor or co-editors, who are not the general director of the Revue (the equivalent to the Editor in Chief of the International Journal of Psychoanalysis). A wide range of members of the Paris Psychoanalytic Society (SPP) have performed this function of editing specific volumes over the years.
There is an implicit, at times explicit, dialogue amongst the authors who contribute to each of the volumes. They tend to refer to each other's work; this is especially true of the volume dedicated to papers given at the Congress of the French Language of that year. This annual congress is usually centred on two or three memoirs, which are long essays written by a member of the SPP and a member of another Society (alternating each year between the French Psychoanalytic Association and another component society). In 2011 the theme of the Congress and the last issue of the Revue was ‘The Maternal’; I discuss this below.
Considering that each volume includes between 15 and 48 papers, in addition to a section of book reviews, plus a section of spontaneous contributions by authors who just wish to present their research [Hors Thème], it is impossible to discuss each of the articles in each volume for the year. I will refer to some ideas and papers that have caught my attention, being perfectly aware that I am leaving out most of the contributions. The aim is just to give the IJP reader some key conceptual points of reference in the volumes, and perhaps entice them to read the Revue itself.
At the end of my review I will briefly outline some of the themes in contemporary French psychoanalysis that permeate the volumes of the Revue in 2011.
This volume has an intriguing title and was edited by Genevieve Bourdellon and Beatrice Ithier who formulated the opening argument.
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