You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
26th November 1964.
Dear Mrs. Knopf,
Your letter has been passed on to me,1 and I am distressed that I should have muddled you up. It is silly of us to discuss medical matters that involve the use of technical terms in a paper like The Observer.
Perhaps you can forget all that about autism. What interests you is the upbringing of normal children, and I have written quite a lot about this. I enclose a book which you may or may not find interesting.
Perhaps you will do best to give up trying to work at all this, and just go on naturally enjoying your experiences. Later you may like to go back over what you experience with a book or two to guide you, but while you are having a child I think you may do best to follow your natural feelings.
If you want direct instruction you may find help from Benjamin Spock's Baby and Child Care (Bodley Head, London, 1955).
Let me know how you get on, and forget about that rare condition called autism.
Yours sincerely,
D. W. Winnicott, F.R.C.P.