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This book is part of the IPA series on Contemporary Freud Turning Points and Critical Issues, which has been published since 1991. It follows the main objective of the series: approaching aspects of Freud’s work from historical as well as from contemporary points of view. In this case, the selected works are the two short articles mentioned in the title of the volume, which were both published a century ago, in 1924. The focus of this book is on psychosis and reality, and the authors’ perspectives expose the complexity and diversity of psychoanalytic approaches to these topics. Eight psychoanalysts, belonging to different geographical regions and following diverse theoretical and clinical approaches, contributed to the book, alongside introductions to both of Freud’s essays written by the editors. There is a valuable trait common to all the articles: all of them include clinical illustrations of the authors’ ideas. I cannot do justice in this review to the varying perspectives put forth by these authors, but only take a bird’s eye view and focus in detail on a couple of examples.
Catalina Bronstein’s first introduction is a particularly useful guide to place these two papers within the context of the development of Freud’s works, especially regarding the intimately connected questions of what psychosis and reality are. Beginning with Neuro-psychoses of Defence, until his unfinished work on Splitting of the Ego, she talks about Freud’s evolving views on psychosis and reality. She also points out how subsequent authors such as Klein, Bion, Segal, Rosenfeld, etc. branched out from Freud.
Gabriela Legorreta’s second introduction deals with the articles of this volume, which take Freud’s ideas as a starting point, together with the contributions of many post-Freudian authors, including those mentioned above plus others such as Searles, Aulagnier, Green, Winnicott, Giovacchini and Schaeffer, to develop their own ideas, proposals and emerging questions about the not-at-all-