William Gillespie is a British psychoanalyst with whose work I was previously unfamiliar. This volume contains a collection of 12 of his published papers, dating from 1940 to 1975. The book begins with a biographical sketch of Gillespie by Michael Sinason that is of considerable historical interest. A second introduction, by Charles Socarides, summarizes some of Gillespie's theoretical contributions and relates them to other work in the area of sexual perversions.

Sinason successfully introduces the reader to Gillespie as someone who has made a significant contribution to the scientific, cultural, and administrative life of the British Psychoanalytical Society. Raised in an atmosphere of strongly evangelical and missionary Christianity, the young Gillespie turned his interest toward psychiatry and psychoanalysis and first sought treatment (with Eduard Hitschmann) and training (with Heinz Hartmann and others)