Rushi Ledermann: 1916-2009

Rushi died on 15^th June, aged 93. She had been ill with Alzheimer's disease for many years and had been looked after by her husband Walter who died just three weeks before she did. They had been married for sixty-three years. Three weeks apart was long enough for her. They leave a son, Jonathan, married to Sarah with four grandchildren.

Rushi gave a great deal of her life to the Society of Analytical Psychology and became an eminent member. She qualified in 1970, became a training analyst in 1981 and retired in 1996, aged eighty. She had a strong presence and will be remembered in very many ways. There was a particular intensity about her and she could have exacting views. These characteristics seemed to go together with her immense enthusiasm for life which extended to her music, her work—particularly her patients, her writing and her family. I especially remember how her eyes could twinkle with delight and a deep warmth.

Rushi was Journal Reviews Editor of this Journal in the mid-1970s but her major contribution was on the subject of narcissistic personality disorder and from 1979 onwards she published a number of influential articles on the subject. These focused on the infantile roots of the disorder, the robot personality and the paucity of symbolization. Her concept of the ‘do-it-yourself-mother’ has been particularly helpful. Her last publication in this Journal was in 1995—a useful article on ‘when not to interpret’. The last paper she gave (which remains unpublished) was on Kandinsky about whom she had an intimate knowledge. Her father, as art professor in Zürich had helped Kandinsky in his career and in gratitude Kandinsky gave him an original painting of a horseman on a rounded mountain. It hung on the family mantlepiece for many years. Later, unfortunately, it had to be sold for financial reasons. Doubtless in researching the painting, it came alive again for Rushi.

Rushi was also one of the founding members and a driving force behind the establishment of t