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This issue focuses on Joseph Lichtenberg’s transformational contributions to psychoanalysis and serves as the introductory issue of a three-part series, “A Psychoanalytic Inquiry Series Dedicated to the Memory of Joseph D. Lichtenberg” (1925–2021). To provide our readers with the breadth and depth of Joe’s enormous creativity and theory-building, we selected four book chapters published over a 34-year-period (1983–2017). The four presented book chapters are: 1) The Psychoanalytic Situation and Infancy, in Psychoanalysis and Infant Research (Lichtenberg, 1983); 2) The Attachment-Affiliation Motivational System, in Psychoanalysis and Motivation (Lichtenberg, 1989); 3) Empathy, Motivational Systems, and a Theory of Cure, in Psychoanalysis and Motivation (Lichtenberg, 1989); and 4) Narrative and Meaning, in Narrative and Meaning: The Foundation of Mind, Creativity, and the Psychoanalytic Dialogue, (Lichtenberg et al., 2017).
In publishing these selections, we are pleased to provide our valued readers with an understanding of Joe’s thinking as it evolved over the years. The chapters demonstrate both Joe’s original thinking and his ongoing efforts to stay open and be creative. Importantly, through his prolific contributions, Joe developed clinical approaches that were helpful and transformational for a range of patients beyond what had been previously deemed possible in psychoanalytic practice.
Four esteemed colleagues, Daniel Posner, Mauricio Cortina, Mel Bornstein, and Daniel Goldin, were invited to consider Joe’s original work and to discuss it from the viewpoint of the present moment in 2024. Additionally, Judith Rustin contributes a paper commenting on Posner’s paper which enriches the issue by providing important ideas and case material. Readers will engage Joe’s original contributions and the accompanying discussion papers provide a window into how Joe’s contributions have held up over the years as well as how they continue to expand and evolve. Hence, the title of t