Two books have recently come to the fore regarding the life and work of Sabina Spielrein: a new edition of Sabina Spielrein: Forgotten Pioneer of Psychoanalysis edited by Coline Covington and Barbara Wharton and a biography, Sex versus Survival, by John Launer. With films, plays, books and conferences about Spielrein, she no longer seems to be a ‘forgotten pioneer’. However, what has been needed is to hear Spielrein in her own voice. Covington and Wharton, both Jungian analysts with many years of experience, began their scholarly attempts to bring that voice forward when they were co-Editors-in-Chief of the Journal of Analytical Psychology; in 2001 they dedicated a special edition to Spielrein and these papers formed the core of the first edition of the current volume.

At the centre of this new edition is Spielrein's unedited paper ‘Destruction as a cause of coming into being’. This was first presented in an abbreviated form as ‘On Transformation’ at Freud's Wednesday night group on 29 November 1911,