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Karterud's book is a Norwegian introduction to self-psychology. The intention has been to write a book which can be used in the education of psychologists and psychiatrists, when it is a question of diagnosis and therapy for patients with personal disorders. However, the book is also directed towards theoretical teaching and supervision in group analysis. The author, professor in psychiatry and training analyst at The Department of Group analysis in Oslo, has written the book in connection with a stay at “The International Study Centre for Self-Psychology”. The centre is run by some of the leading personalities within self-psychology today, namely Paul and Anna Ornstein.
Karterud has thus been to visit the “source” of self-psychology and to absorb nourishment to write his book about Kohut's authorship. The result is a lucid and well-written presentation which bears witness of a welldigested integration of the theory which within the psychoanalytic pluralism is called “self-psychology”. Karterud has chosen to render Kohut's authorship chronologically and he follows Paul Ornstein's way of dividing Kohut's authorship into central focal points. The historical perspective implies that the reader is given an impression of Kohut's own development as well as how his articles and books evolved through discussions with colleagues of the school of ego psychology. In this way, Karterud explains not only Kohut's own struggle of escaping the attachment to father Freud, but also how self-psychology is “the legitimate child of the school of ego psychology”, as Karterud says. The reader is inspired to reflect on Kohut's personal motives to write about a particular problem at this particular point in his life through the way in which Karterud has edited the texts and commented on their historical context; e.g., was Kohut working on the article “On courage” in order to gather courage to break away from the establishment, i.e., the ego psychology and follow his own “self-psychological”