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Need I say that it is exhilarating to participate in a symposium on one's own work — or that I am nearly awed by the distinction of the list of essayists who have contributed to this endeavor? Probably not. It may be less superfluous to record my bewilderment about the variety of misperceptions produced by my book, which seemed so lucid when I sent it to the printers! I take solace in the fact that readers who misunder-stood one thing or another did discern my meaning accurately on the other major issues. The problem probably derives from the complexity of the material rather than from mere obscurity: It is all too easy to lose the thread of the argument. I am very grateful, therefore, for the seriousness and hard work represented by these essays.
Beyond Interpretation is a terse statement of my hypotheses; its bare bones will have to be fleshed out in the future. I cannot hope to do justice to that task here, but I have tried to begin such an effort in a companion volume, Advances in Clinical Psychoanalysis (1981). There I take up a series of specific topics dealing with questions of nosology, analytic technique, and the scope of psychoanalysis as treatment. Some of the essayists express satisfaction with the amount of clinical material used to illustrate my theses in Beyond Interpretation, but I regard the three case reports in the book as providing but an overview of the application of my technical recommendations. The primary function