You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
Although Dr. Heilbrunn's paper is a provoking consideration of an increasingly important part of the current adolescent scene, I found it somewhat frustrating in its attempt to cover
several areas in a brief presentation, namely, the clinical, the socio-psychoanalytic and the preventive. I regret, too, that Dr. Heilbrunn accepts so unconditionally the all-inclusive term “beatnik” for the group which he describes. The term is much used, unfortunately, more to sneer at the collective state of hygiene or unconventional dress than to describe individual dynamic features. At one point, he uses a more dynamic term: “revolutionary.” I would expand this to: “the passive-depressive revolutionaries.”
Dr. Heilbrunn postulates a “cultural potential” for this group, an ambitious task to undertake, indeed, since it involves such a very personal judgment of what is optimal in a culture. His discussion suggests an understandable cultural bias and perhaps even nostalgia. The comparison to “European cousins” and the “circle which surrounded Goethe” omits mention of several important changes since the passing of those eras, especially the vast increase in population, size of cities and the heightened emphasis on science and technology, to mention but a few. In any such large group as today's “beatniks,” ideals and creative individuals also do exist but differ, obviously, from those of the days of Goethe or Sturm und Drang. Moreover, historical myopia makes it difficult for us to single out at this time which will be the enduring literary, artistic productions or individuals.
In his case illustrations, Dr. Heilbrunn describes clearly John's retreat from oedipal competition, but I feel that he underemphasizes John's probable rage at the seductive mother and the absent father as a factor in the regression to the oral, passive-dependent depressive level. Recalling Erikson's writings, the importance of ego identity, reinforced by group membership, is well stated: “They felt painfully ‘out’