In Memory of Eglé Laufer (1925-2021)

Eglé Laufer was born in Vienna in 1925 and passed away in London in 2021. She was a Distinguished Fellow of the British Psychoanalytic Society and Founder and President of the Brent Centre for Young People. Eglé had moved to London with her mother and her stepfather when she was seven years old; her mother was a child psychiatrist and her stepfather a mathematician. Eglé initially gained a degree in mathematics and physics but later decided to train as a psychoanalyst.

I had the chance to enjoy a nearly fifty-year-long affectionate relationship with Eglé. It started with my first visit in 1973 to the Brent Centre for Young People in London, which she had founded a few years before with her husband, Moses Laufer, and a few other psychoanalysts committed to treating severely ill adolescent patients. This visit was the beginning of my ongoing relationship with both Eglé and Moses Laufer although, after 1999, when Moe’s health deteriorated so badly, we had to go on with two instead of three. The Laufers visited my psychiatric outpatient clinic for adolescents in Geneva many, many times. As they were involved in the training programme in child, adolescent and adult psychiatry, generations of trainees are indebted to them for their unique teaching and still feel grateful today for all that they have learned.

Before focusing on adolescence, Eglé started her professional experience with adult patients, mainly female patients, postpartum psychosis and the prevention of breakdown. Like her I was trained as an adult psychoanalyst and not as a child psychoanalyst, as Moses Laufer was. Over the years, Eglé remained deeply interested in femininity, the development of female sexuality and masturbation in female adolescents. However, most of her scientific work is a joint venture with her husband, i.e. with a double authorship: Eglé and Moses Laufer.

Everywhere in the world, for all those concerned with ill adolescents and adolescent psychopathology, reference will be made to the Lauf