The definition of character continues to be one of the most difficult and ultimately elusive propositions in psychoanalytic research. The authors of this volume have drawn together some of the major relevant contributions to their subject, from Freud through Erikson. One misses references to such major contemporaries as Lewin and Greenacre, not to mention Nunberg's classic paper on the synthetic function. The authors deserve credit for granting a fuller emphasis than is usually given to Wilhelm Reich's fundamental and lasting contributions to psychoanalytic characterology.

Although a significant number of sophisticated approaches to the study of character have been devised in recent years, the techniques