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Sitting on a Suitcase is a remarkable and deeply moving collection of psychoanalytically informed autobiographical essays. It brings together eighteen contributors, all of whom work from psychoanalytic or systems psychodynamic perspectives, to explore how Jewish identity, historical trauma, and transgenerational inheritance have shaped their lives. The suitcase functions as the book's central metaphor, representing both the psychic weight of exile and the readiness, or fear, of needing to flee. Each chapter author animates this metaphor differently, offering the reader a multifaceted picture of what it means to carry the emotional and symbolic residue of Jewish history.
The number of contributors is not incidental. As the editors note, they chose eighteen authors unconsciously, only later realising the number holds deep cultural significance in Jewish life. In Hebrew, eighteen is the numerical value of the word chai, meaning “life”. This realisation reframes the project as not only an act of mourning or remembering, but also one of affirmation and survival.
The book is organised into four sections, each introduced by an evocative illustration from Kristof Bien. These images do more than demarcate themes. They resonate emotionally with the stories that follow. The sections trace a thoughtful arc from Jewish origins, through marginality and belonging, on to emigration and identity, and finally to the unsettling prospect of history repeating itself.
The book's framing elements include a preface by Rowan Williams, a closing reflection by Dorothee von Tippelskirch-Eissing, and a spiritual epilogue by Rabbi Jonathan Wittenberg. These offer both societal and psychic containment for the material within. This includes the crucial inclusion of two non-Jewish German contributors: Claudia Nagel (Introduction) and Dorothee von Tippelskirch-Eissing (Conclusions). The editors explicitly identify them as German and non-Jewish psychoanalysts. These writers reflect on their national his