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As Hanna Segal says about this book, “It combines a clinical approach with a scholarly grasp of theory and brings in new ideas which illuminate both theory and clinical practice” (p. x) In addition, this book has a delicate and gentle quality rarely seen in scientific writings, even psychoanalytic ones. Jean-Michel Quinodoz is clearly an analyst with a finely honed scholarly mind equal to that of any academic. At the same time, he has a delicate, at times magical, feel for the qualities of the psychoanalytic encounter that cannot be captured in the language of science. Quinodoz endeared himself to me from the outset by his frequent quotations from the exquisite and beautiful Le Petit Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. This absorbing tale describes the fantasy of an intimate relationship and even love that eventually ends up in a termination that is both traumatic and growth enhancing.
Segal's foreword does not capture the essential component of taming, stated in the title and applied in the first quotation from the little prince, “If you want a friend, tame me!” Quinodoz begins by stating, “Solitude has two faces: it may be a deadly counselor or tamed and may become a friend of infinite worth.” His writings illustrated for me certain defects in my own handling of termination or of separations within the analytic process. Of