Therese Benedek, M.D—1892-1977

On October 27, 1977, death came to Therese Benedek after a short illness. On November 8, she would have been eighty-five years old. With her passing, psychoanalysis has lost another of its creative pioneers, and all of us whose personal life she touched have lost a great teacher and a loving friend.

Her long creative life began in 1892 in Hungary. While still in the Gymnasium, she became interested in the new ideas coming out of Vienna about dreams and hysterical symptoms. The group of girls to which she belonged in 1910 "wanted to learn about things not taught in school" and so invited Eugene Harnik to speak to them. His lecture and her innate curiosity about life determined her choice of medicine as a career. The same curiosity led her to attend Ferenczi's lectures at the University of Budapest, from which she was graduated in 1916. In 1918 after the war and before moving to Leipzig with her husband, Tibor, she had a five-month analysis with Ferenczi. As short as it was, the experience "carried with it the conviction of knowing something that was unknown and unknowable before." In those days, a short experience on the couch was all the training that was available toward becoming an analyst. But from 1920 to 1923, she was able to continue her analytic education at the newly established Berlin Institute, taking seminars and supervision with Abraham and Eitingon.

Deeply intuitive and empathic, Therese was always available to her students and her patients. She followed the lead of her own analyst who recommended "elasticity in technique." One might consider Therese's technique parametric in its temporary deviation from the orthodox line. Nevertheless, it met her patients' needs and always kept in focus the goals of analysis. She expected "work" from her patients and from her students, but she was never in a hurry, believing that the therapeutic and educational processes were, in essence, developmental. Her compassion