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This slim and dense volume is the result of a long-standing dialogue and collaboration between psychoanalysts working in at least six European countries who have worked together over a sustained period, under the auspices of the European Psychoanalytical Federation since 2013, focusing specifically on the field of psychosomatics - its practice, its theory and its debates.
The task and methodology are described by the senior author Jacques Press (from Switzerland):
It was time to tackle the various theoretical approaches in the field of psychosomatics. We were intent on rooting our reflections in clinical work. … Exposing ourselves through our daily clinical practice not only contributed to creating friendly ties in the group and fostering dynamics of exchange and interaction that were respectful of our differences, it also contributed to the formation of a group identity … we each had to confront unfamiliar ways of thinking and tolerate differences between us, but we also had to confront and make explicit what was often implicit in our own way of thinking and thereby become more aware of it. (1)
As a result, the book is designed in an unusual way. After two cases are presented in the opening section, a further nine chapters ensue, each of them a triad of contributions on an important theme, always referring back to the two initial clinical examples and to the theoretical models that inform each writer’s work. Each triad consists of two authors offering their perspective of the topic under discussion, and then a third contributor, a commentator, “an avatar of the ‘silent observer in our workshops’ discusses the two viewpoints,” at times challenging them, and striving to account for their visible and less visible divergences and convergences. “Bringing a third eye to bear on things, the commentator opens up a new space, putting the two authors’ contributions in perspective and shedding a new light on them” (Press, 4).
Right at the end of the book, after the two clinical