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This book was very interesting to read, and it stimulated my thinking. Sometimes, however, it made me wonder and filled me with surprise. In this paper, I give a reflection of my wondering, concentrating on two points.
First, I learned from this book, more strongly than I would have supposed, that in the United States there seems to exist a clear-cut dichotomy between two tendencies. The first is the “classical” one, also called the “Freudian” (but why it should be more Freudian than the other leaves us Europeans with a feeling of mystery), which, in the presentation of Aron, means ego-psychological or drive-discharge oriented (the two are taken together). The second tendency is (the “good”) one—relationship oriented. This dichotomy runs through the entire book, evidently historically, institutionally, and culturally determined. Such a dichotomy already presents some difficulties when trying to rethink psychoanalytic experiences in the European context. The Kleinian view, for instance, is certainly relationship based, but it is also drive oriented, as libido and death instinct in this view are supposed to play a fundamental role in human life. Although countertransference and projective identification—major concepts in post-Kleinian theory—were by far not the “cup of tea” of Melanie Klein,