Freud's intention to make psychoanalysis a classical, Newtonian science led him to postulate that a training analysis could eliminate analyst transference. The analyst could then act clinically as an objective purveyor of an objectively true, analytic theory. The legitimate stance and place of the analyst in analytic theory and practice has been a thorn in the side of psychoanalysis ever since. From the most extreme classical analysts who insist that analytic theory requires and can achieve objectivity, to the most extreme relational analysts who personalize analysis at the expense of objectivity altogether, analysts struggle with the legacy of Freud's postulate. Unrecognized in this struggle is that there is no analytic concept that can be used to address Freud's postulate, to integrate the analyst as a person into psychoanalytic theory, and that is general enough to encompass all analytic schools.

This paper defines Elaborative Truth as such a concept. Essentially, it generalizes to waking life Freud's concept of Secondary Elaboration in dreaming. It will be used to clarify the nature of analytic non objectivity and persistent analyst transference, to theoretically elevate the analyst to a proper role in clinical practice, to make the person of the analyst an analytic object of analytic scrutiny, and to reveal the logical relation between general analytic theory and clinical practice.