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There is Much diversity in current psychoanalytic literature, but for many years now my attention has been particularly drawn to Heinz Kohut's works on narcissism (KOHUT 12, 13, 14, 15). Kohut has struck me in many ways as a kindred spirit, his views being akin to my own on psychology, and his therapeutic approach similar to mine which, in itself, is closely related to C. G. Jung's analytical psychology. While reading Kohut's often microscopically subtle descriptions and interpretations, traits of various analysands, including the analysand I am for myself, would immediately come to mind. I was also struck again and again by how close Kohut seemed to analytical psychology, even in the way he sees the basic problem of psychological theorising. Because he firmly believes that ‘all worthwhile theorising is tentative, probing, provisional—contains an element of playfulness’ (KOHUT 15, p. 206), Kohut is tolerant about possible inconsistencies in psychological theory. As he writes, ‘I am using the word playfulness advisedly to contrast the basic attitude of creative science with that of dogmatic religion’ (KOHUT 15, p. 207). Here we have a striking parallel with Jung who, in his memoirs, complains about Freud's dogmatism with the following words, ‘As I saw it, scientific truth was a hypothesis which might be adequate for the moment but was not to be preserved as an article of faith for all time’ (JUNG 11, p. 148).
Furthermore, Kohut postulates, for example, that so-called ‘narcissistic libido’ goes through a progress of formation and transformation and can, in the course of a lifetime, stimulate the maturation processes of a personality. The results of this maturation he calls empathy, creativity, humour and wisdom. This view is quite contrary to that of classical psychoanalytic theory, according to which in healthy development narcissistic libido always transforms into object libido. In contrast, Kohut believes that so-called narcissistic libido has its own capacity for t