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S. Weintrobe. The New Library of Psychoanalysis ‘Beyond the Couch Series’, Hove, Routledge, 2013, xxii+255 pp., £ 27.99 (paperback), ISBN 978-0-415-66762-3
This is a rich and fascinating book that makes for gripping reading. It brings together different disciplines and is therefore interesting for a wide range of readers. There are contributions from psychoanalysts and psychotherapists from different orientations and working with different patient groups, alongside contributions from ecologists and climate scientists. To these are added contributions from climate activists and professionals with experience in advertising campaigns.
The book clearly explains psychoanalytic concepts, so that a reader not accustomed to this way of thinking can gain an understanding. At the same time, there are many accounts from the consulting room and from literature, so that it is also delightful reading for those trained in the field. Similarly, the reader who is less accustomed with the psycho-social and political approach, or less knowledgeable about effects of climate change will also be engaged by the well-written contributions from those fields. It is a book that combines psychoanalytic and interdisciplinary perspectives, as promised in the title, and does so in an extremely rich way. As all chapters are discussed by one or two people, and sometimes followed by a response from the author, the reader is helped to follow the arguments. The chapters lead coherently from one to the next.
Yet, in an emotional sense, it is not easy reading. I experienced in myself just those feelings described in the book: the difficulty of facing the destruction that has been done, the guilt of not doing enough and the conflict of not wanting to give up a comfortable life style that is detrimental and causes suffering to human beings and species elsewhere in the world.
Every chapter in the book contributes valuably to the whole and leaves a distinct impression. It is not possible to do justice to the co