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On the cover of Psychoanalytic Filiations we see a reproduction of Ernst Falzeder's ‘spaghetti-junction’ graph. The famous graph was hand-drawn with magic markers by the author himself. It shows, by way of many squiggly lines, which psychoanalyst was analyzed by whom (the psychoanalytic ‘filiations’, as Falzeder calls them). All of those lines, in one way or another, trace back to Freud. This playful and slightly mischievous attitude towards the ‘who's who’ in psychoanalysis characterizes Falzeder's writings, too. The essays in this volume span nearly a quarter century; the scholarship is immaculate.
Falzeder was chief editor of the correspondence between Freud and Ferenczi, and editor of the complete letters of Freud and Abraham. He has published more than two hundred papers on the history, theory and technique of psychoanalysis and analytical psychology. For many years, he studied the personal correspondences of Freud, Jung and the first generation of psychoanalysts. This book collects fifteen of Falzeder's most important papers (three are co-authored). What distinguishes these papers from other histories of psychoanalysis and the early psychoanalytic movement is that Falzeder, himself trained as a clinician, seems to bear in mind the repercussions of his work - not only for an understanding of the genesis of psychoanalysis as a movement, but also for clinicians and their practice. Most of the essays, then, are resolutely historical, but also resonate clinically. ‘I am neither interested in Freud and psychoanalysis bashing,’ he writes, ‘nor in their idolatry’ (p. 52). For this balanced view, the papers in this volume will be of use to historians as well as practitioners.
The book unashamedly takes as its approach the history of ideas. Yet Falzeder does not fall into the trap of severing those ideas from the persons who conceived and held them. On the other hand, it is also not a mere series of (psycho-)biographical portraits. ‘A detailed examination,’ Falzeder tells