The Hands of the Living God1: “Finding the Familiar in the Unfamiliar”2

Nina Farhi (1943–2009) was an eminent, highly esteemed Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist and Supervisor who practiced independently in London for 30 years. She was a member of the training committee of the Guild of Psychotherapists (1989–1999) and Director of the Squiggle Foundation (1989–1996). For many years, she also supervised the staff team at the erstwhile Belle Ridley Day Hospital, an NHS psychiatric unit committed to the long-term treatment of some of the most damaged people in society. She lectured very extensively in Britain and internationally and became a visiting lecturer at Bar Ilan University near Tel Aviv. She wrote a number of journal papers, some of which were translated into French and Greek. She also published three major papers in international journals in the United States: “‘In Her Mother's Name’: Imitation, a Pre-identificatory Mechanism of Defense” (Contemporary Psychoanalysis, 2003), “In the Beginning There Was Darkness: Images Across the Void” (Contemporary Psychoanalysis, 2008), and “The Hands of the Living God: ‘Finding the Familiar in the Unfamiliar’” (Psychoanalytic Dialogues, 2010). She was a member of the Guild of Psychotherapists and the Squiggle Foundation, both based in London.