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This book is a collection of essays already published or discussed by the author with small groups of psychoanalysts and psychotherapists over the last ten years. Their specific content varies a great deal, but they are centred around the theme of adolescence, a delicate stage of development, and also a specific mental state, irrespective of the age of the subject. The approach is influenced by the Kleinian, or rather post-Kleinian model, by that group of writers who developed Melanie Klein's work, from Bion, E. Bick and Money-Kyrle, to Meltzer. Lussana would probably use the term “late Kleinian”, which he recently proposed, half-jokingly, to express how he felt part of an advanced stage in Kleinian thought and tradition, perhaps hesitating to admit changes in theory and practice.
In examining his theme from various points of view, Lussana not only uses his clinical experience (concentrating especially on dreams), but also his knowledge of literature, art and cinema in order to “compare” and “confirm” his hypotheses and ideas wherever possible. This is another of the common threads running through the book, as the title itself indicates. The author knows he is exposing himself to criticism and objections by such hazardous couplings as case history and novel, or case history plus cinema plus art. As