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It is with great interest that I have read Robert Hooberman's most recent book, and there is much to recommend it. Notwithstanding the title, the author's aim is to demonstrate that a melding of classical theory and object relations in approaching the patient is both possible and optimal. As we all know, since the beginning of our science, psychoanalytic theorizing has resulted in repeated “splits”; shifts in theoretical focus, combined with the disruptive effects of political and social allegiances within institutes have led to bitter disagreement and ultimately the formation of new schools of psychoanalysis, as Rangell has pointed out.1
Proliferating therapeutic and theoretical perspectives have been difficult for beginning psychoanalysts to integrate into their work. This frequently has resulted in either an inflexible adherence to one theory and technique, or the stance that “anything goes.” Early on in this short book, Hooberman states his belief that “the unique contributions of seemingly competing theories need not necessarily compete at all; my effort in this book is to show how apparently different aspects of the psyche can be addressed together” (p. 4). Although there may not always be agreement with his particular recipe for doing this, his clinical material and explications of his technique are valuable and worthwhile.
Because of Hooberman's stated aim to bring many different ideas together, theoretical concepts can be given only thumbnail descriptions, but these are enriched by clinical examples and benefit from a broad