Since psychoanalysis has grown to the point that its literature is difficult to keep up with, one seeks certain volumes that have consistently contained contributions of a scholarly stature, and whose editorial policies take cognizance of the major developments in the field. In its twenty-first annual volume, The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child has again distinguished itself. While it covers central theoretical positions such as ego psychology and perennially challenging topics such as dreams and primal scene experiences, it leaves one with the feeling that developmental psychology is in its ascendancy and through it new territories of the mind and behavior are being explored.

This volume begins with a lucid short history of child psychoanalysis given by Anna Freud at the first scientific meeting of the American Association for Child Psychoanalysis. As the papers in the book unfold, one is more and more aware that child analysis is