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This book explores the question: What actually became of the majority of analysts who managed to get out of the Third Reich, and how did their experiences in Europe, and later in America, affect their professional contributions, which, in turn, affected psychoanalysis in America? Did their personal subjective traumas of anti-Semitic humiliations, of exile, of the loss of family members to the horrific Shoah and holocaust,
of the effort of relocation and readjustment play a role in their choice or focus of their point of view?
The author, Emily A. Kuriloff, is a second-generation immigrant, who grew up in the 1960s and became an analyst. Why did she become so interested in this question? The author regards this as a legitimate question and introduces herself. The talk at the dinner table in her youth was as much about Nazi collaboration and the holocaust as about Vietnam. Her family story evolved much about her ever-present grandmother, who left anti-Semitic Poland to embrace “La Belle France,” which, in time, became another nightmare when the Nazis took over and she was brought to America. She was unable to adapt to this final displacement. She only criticized America as being superficial, while, she clung to her memory of “La Belle France.” She could not allow herself to truly or fully know or speak about her history. The author states that ineffably her grandmother's story became her mother's and her own. I believe she is suggesting that her grandmother's story sensitized her to the power of hidden trauma to affect one's life.
Kuriloff's initial exploration of the literature was disappointing. Only a very few analysts referred to the impact of past personal experiences. She decided to base her book largely on material she would gather through personal interviews. She was aware of the challenge this presented. The first two chapters are about the subjectivity of history taking and about the importance of understanding context, meaning, and approaches to life's even