René Spitz came to Denver in 1956 and except for a five-year stint in Geneva during the mid-sixties, spent his remaining years here. Born in Vienna in 1887, he died in Denver in 1974. After a long career spent analyzing, teaching, and doing research, he had come to Denver, so he told us, to “retire” (we often joked about that) and to help Herb Gaskill and others found a psychoanalytic institute in the mountainous west. René was an expressive and passionate man, dedicated to psychoanalysis. His curiosity was so far-reaching that many of us had the impression that in his later years he metabolized new ideas even more enthusiastically than food—and his epicurean pleasures were legendary. Reflecting on René's contributions, I am struck with the extent to which his attitudes and ways were internalized by those of us for whom he was a special mentor. These intangibles, so internalized, became values for our early psychoanalytic community.
As a psychoanalytic mentor, René showed an enthusiasm for psychoanalytic work, especially in integrating new ideas, that was pervasive. No one who was present will ever forget René during Society meetings or psychiatric grand rounds, sitting up front with the latest recording device or camera, capturing words and slides for later study. When the Denver Institute began classes, I was fortunate to be in the first cohort of trainees to attend his seminars. He spoke of the identity that formed the backdrop for his clinical decision making: “First, I am a human being; second, I am a doctor; third, I am a psychiatrist; fourth, I am a psychoanalyst.” While he was disciplined about technique and acknowledged the importance of maintaining the analytic situation, it may surprise readers to know that he was not an archaeologist, reconstructing the past, but rather a practical analyst who believed in maximizing the analysand's activity. The function of a good interpretation, he taught, “was to guide a patient to the next step.”
In his published work on transference and countertransference, he emphasized developmental principles in the psychoanalytic situation that had their roots in mother-child interactions. But for Spitz, discussions of early development in analytic process had to do not so much with a reconstructed past as with early modes of functioning. He emphasized the element of dialogue in the analytic relationship, and its intrapsychic reverberations. Spitz's notion of the “diatrophic attitude” was analogous to healthy early caregiving; when exercised by the analyst, the attitude was conducive to the formation of a working alliance. Spitz's seminars often put explicit emphasis on the processes of precise interpretation, but always in the background was the importance of the analyst's emotional communication and use of empathy.
René was purportedly the first didactic analysand of Freud. His personal analysis took place in 1910–1911. He told us that he announced to Freud, after Ferenczi had introduced him, that “if analysis works so well on neurotics, why should it riot be even more valuable for a normal person like I am?” He provided a vivid historical link to those early days in Vienna and frequently offered vignettes illustrating Freud's curiosity, humane way of working, and profound dedication.
René Spitz as research mentor was no less expressive. In the two years before he left for his interlude in Geneva, I had the great fortune to have him as research supervisor for our nursery observations. Following his return from Geneva and throughout his remaining five years, René was an active participant in our newly formed Developmental Psychobiology Research Group, showing himself an eager student of new ideas in neurobiology, pediatrics, animal behavior, child development, and psychopathology. He continually reformulated his ideas, taking new knowledge into account, and often provided dramatic discussions in our seminars. He often quoted his friend of later life, Konrad Lorenz, saying that “any scientist worth his salt should discard a favorite hypothesis before breakfast.” He talked a lot about his ideas concerning affective communication and developmental transitions, and spoke often of his enthusiasm for observing development and participating in “new beginnings.”
It is remarkable that when he first began observing infants and mothers and publishing his research, René was already in his late forties. His career showed the extent to which research and development are possible at mid-life and even later. A notable instance comes to mind in which Spitz took a creative turn that was to prove pivotal. He revised his idea that psychological development is an uninterrupted process, and this revision led him to his major theory concerning transformations in development. Set forth in A Genetic Field Theory of Ego Formation in 1959, this theory became the basis of my laboratory's research program for a decade. In his final days he told me how he wanted his “last words” to be remembered. It seems fitting to mention them here: “Survival, adaptation, evolution.”