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This impressive volume begins with a history of the development of attachment theory in the work of John Bowlby and illustrates how that theory took shape in part as an intended corrective to predominating classical psychoanalytic views of the time. For the uninitiated, Eagle's historical introduction quickly and deftly tells the story of Bowlby's attempts to reform psychoanalysis through the application of scientific theories of ethology, information theory and cybernetic systems theory, as well as his efforts to remain relevant within the world of psychoanalysis after having raised serious questions about its central tenets. The reaction of the analytic world to Bowlby's attachment theory resulted in a long-standing feeling of “bad blood” (Fonagy, 2001, p. 1) between the two, affirming a bias that analysts need not become acquainted with attachment theory in order to dismiss it.
Eagle's historical introduction is perhaps meant to give the psychoanalytic reader a sense that the core tenets of attachment theory he presents in Chapter