Letter from Buenos Aires

Writings by Celes E. Cárcamo and Freud and Words by Fidias Cesio and coworkers are two very different books that may serve as examples of the range of psychoanalysis as it is practiced in Buenos Aires. Cárcamo's is a collection of writings by a pioneer and master of psychoanalysis who died in 1990. The other book is the result of ten years of work by a group led by Cesio who was recently elected President of the Argentine Psychoanalytical Association.

The richness of both volumes is the product of serious reflection, exquisite scrutiny, and subtle study. Much is said explicitly, and there are many implications for further research.

Celes Cárcamo was one of the pioneers of psychoanalysis in Argentina. After graduating from medical school in Buenos Aires, he discovered his interest in psychiatry, psychotherapy, and, by the mid 1920s, psychoanalysis. Realizing that psychoanalytic technique could not be self-taught, he decided to travel abroad to get his training in Paris (French was his second language). Paul Schiff was his training analyst, and he worked with Rudolph Loewenstein and Charles Other. His teachers were Lagache, Nacht, Hartmann, and de Saussure among others. In 1939 he returned to Buenos Aires. While in Europe he had met Angel Garma, a Spanish psychoanalyst who had finished his training in Berlin and recommended Cárcamo to family and friends to help him start his practice in Argentina. In 1942, both of them founded the Argentine Psychoanalytic Association with a small group of colleagues whom they analyzed and supervised.

Cárcamo was the first professor of psychoanalytic technique, the first Director of the Institute of Psychoanalysis, and the second President of the APA. In 1958 he organized the first Postgraduate Course in Medical Psychology at the School of Medicine, University of Buenos Aires. He was active in the training of young analysts until his death.