What makes one reader look for issues of social conformity in Kafka's "Metamorphosis" while another concentrates on the relationship between Gregor Samsa and his father?

"Self-Analysis in Literary Study" investigates how the psychoanalytic self-analysis enables readers to gain a deeper understanding of literature as well as themselves.

In the past scholars have largely ignored self-analysis as an aid to approaching literature. The contributors in "Self-Analysis in Literary Study" boldly explore how the psyche affects intellectual intellectual discovery in the realm of applied psychoanalysis.

Jeffrey Berman confronts a close friend's suicide through Camus and his student's diaries, kept for an English class. Language, family history, and an attachment to Kafka are addressed in David Bleich's essay. Barbara Ann Schapiro writes of her attraction to Virginia Woolf during her emotional senior year of college. Other essayists include Daniel Rancour-Laferriere, Norman N. Holland, Bernard J. Paris, Steven Rosen, and Michael Steig.

Written for both scholars in the fields of psychology and literature and for a general audience intrigued by self- analysis as a tool for gaining insight, "Self-Analysis in Literary Study" answers traditional questions about literature and raises challenging new ones.

The book is an in depth exploration of four categories that can define human experience. No prior book has tied the four conditions together or related them to faulty parenting.

The current resurgence of interest in the scientific origins of psychoanalysis has overshadowed the artistic and literary models to which Freud had recourse time and again in the development and presentation of his theories. It is this neglected aesthetic wellspring of psychoanalysis to which Harry Trosman calls attention in Freud and the Imaginative World.

Trosman enriches our understanding of psychoanalysis by demonstrating how Freud's cultural and humanistic commitments guided his pursuit of a science of mind. Toward this end, he undertakes a number of challenging tasks: to situate Freud in the formative culture of his time, to adumbrate the human concerns that infromed his work in the natural sciences, and to delineate the multiple "modes of influence" that fostered his creativity. The second part of the book moves from the cultural sources of Freud's creativity to the psychoanalytic contribution to our understanding of art and literature. Here, Trosman focuses on the consumer of art and literature, tracing psychoanalytic perspectives on aesthetic responsiveness from Freud to the present. Trosman's critical review of the da Vinci and Hamlet literature illustrates the limitations as well as the explanatory potential of the two principal genres of applied psychoanalytic work, and leads naturally to the reflective estimation of psychoanalysis and creativity that concludes the work.

Throughout, Trosman is a well-informed and engaging guide, both to the imaginative Freud and to the abundant literature on psychoanalysis and the arts. He documents Freud's continuing indebtedness to the literary models that nourished his theorizing and gave shape to his narrative clinical expositions, even as he takes pains to show how psychoanalysis has, in many ways, outgrown Freud's own reductive explanations of aesthetic phenomena. A skillfully crafted overview, Freud and the Imaginative World is an exemplary introduction to a crucial aspect of the Freudian legacy.

This book theorizes five youth television series: "Dawson""'s Creek, Freaks and Geeks, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Roswell, " and" Smallville "from a psychoanalytic perspective drawing on the meeting ground between Jacques Lacan, Gilles Deleuze, and Felix Guattari. jagodzinski develops the notion of self-refleXivity (as distinct from self-reflection and self reflexion) to identify that aspect of the inhuman within ourselves, namely the order of the drives that these series explore. It is argued that the narratology of the post-Gothic form of "Buffy, Roswell, "and" Smallville" is the structure of paranoid schizophrenia. A hyper-self-reflexivity informs "Dawson's Creek," while "Freaks and Greeks" deals with ethical dilemmas.

This is the first detailed assessment of the life and work of Felix Guattari--"Mr. Anti" as the French press labelled him--the friend of and collaborator with Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Lacan and Antonio Negri, and one of the 20th Century's last great activist-intellectuals. Guattari is widely known for his celebrated writings with Deleuze, but these writings do not represent the true breadth and impact of his thinking, writing and activism. Guattari's major work as a clinical and theoretical innovator in psychoanalysis was closely linked to his participation in struggles against European right-wing politics. Felix Guattari introduces the reader to the diversity and sheer range of Guattari's interests, from anti-psychiatry, to Japanese culture, political activism and his theorizing of subjectification.Highlighting why Guattari's work is of increasing relevance to contemporary political, psychoanalytical and philosophical thought, Felix Guattari: An Aberrant Introduction presents the reader with an adventurous and provocative introduction to this radical thinker.

Second Thoughts is a collection of papers on Schizophrenia, Linking and Thinking, and is a commentary upon them in the light of later work. Originally composed between 1950 and 1962, it derives its title from the lengthy critical commentary which Bion attached to these case histories in the year of publication, 1967, and represents the evolutionary change of position marked in his three previous books and brought to further refinement in the present work.

Bion's identification of reverie as a psychoanalytic concept has drawn attention to a dimension of the analyst's experience with tremendous potential to enrich our interpretive understanding. The courage of these authors in revealing their own process of reverie as transformed into the action of psychoanalysis will inspire and foster further investigation of this fruitful yet heretofore infrequently explored area of psychoanalytic discovery.

Recent years have seen a renewed interest in the work of the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. Philosophers and political theorists have engaged Lacan's concept of the 'Real' in particular, with Slavoj i ek and Alain Badiou deriving profound philosophical and political consequences from what is the most difficult of Lacan's ideas. This is the first book in English to explore in detail the genesis and consequences of Lacan's concept of the 'Real', providing readers with an invaluable key to one of the most influential ideas of modern times.

During the rise of fascism and anti-Semitism in Germany, Albert Einstein wrote to Sigmund Freud asking the fundamental question: What can be done to liberate humanity from the menace of war? The psychoanalyst replied at length and their exchange of letters (reproduced here) was published in March 1933 under the title Why War?. The book would be included in the book burnings in Berlin on 10th of May that year. Why War? is important in Freud's work because in it he develops a fundamental idea that leads him to conclude that the life and death drives are linked - a thought that he had already entertained in works such as Death and Us (1915), which is also included here. In a terrible irony, Freud dedicated a copy of Why War? to Mussolini, who nonetheless instituted a police investigation of its author. The contributors to this volume explore the reasons underlying the dedication, as well as giving their own reflections on the genesis of war.

Wilhelm Stekel was an Austrian physician and psychologist and one of Freud's earliest followers. A prolific writer, this book originally published in 1921, was considered by the translator 'the best general introduction of its author to the English public', containing as is does many of his central ideas. Although the author had already fallen out with him by this time, in the preface to this book, he acknowledges Freud's significance to the field and says he regards his 'Psycho-Analysis as being a step towards a new psycho-therapy'.

This book explores what we mean when we use the term "perversion." Are we dealing with a sexological classification, a mental disturbance, an ethical deviation, a hedonistic style, or an historical-cultural artifact? The book retraces some of the fundamental stages in the field of psychoanalytic thought-from Freud to Masud Khan, Stoller, and Lacan-and proposes an original approach: that "paraphilias" today are taken as an ethical failure of the sexual relationship with the other. The perversions signal a specific relationship with the other, who is treated not simply as a sexual object, but someone whose subjectivity is ably exploited precisely in order to get a perverse pleasure. Acts, if considered perverse, are understood as a metaphorical re-edition of a trauma, above all sexual, in which the subject (as a child) suffered the bitter experience of exclusion or jealousy.

The relationship between psychoanalysis and history is long-standing, productive and controversial. From Freud onward, psychoanalytic thinkers have looked to history for insights into the operations of the human mind. Historians have been more equivocal about the value of psychoanalysis for their discipline. But recent decades have seen a growing interest in psychoanalysis across the Humanities. History and Psyche brings together some of the best work in this area, in essays by sixteen leading scholars. Topics explored include Luther and psychobiography, empathy and historical subjectivity, the political history of the Oedipus complex, and childhood in early modernity.

This book focuses on the priority that psychoanalysis places on the individual, how the treatment is conceived theoretically and the ways it can be incorporated in the overall organisation of an institution. It brings together the histories of a number of psychoanalytically informed hospitals.

This book provides the reader with rich evidence of the very contemporaneity of Karl Abraham, reminding the reader of his unique clinical contributions to such diverse areas of concentration as the psychoses, depression, and the pre-oedipal.

This book focuses upon theories of the Oedipus complex beginning with the theory that Freud gradually developed, starting with his recognition that it is "an integral constituent of the neuroses". It explores the main theories of the Oedipus complex in accessible languages.

"This gathering of post-modern metafreudians is entertaining, provocative and thoughtful. The quality of thought is playful and kaleidoscopic...Looking at Sophocles' Oedipus, Shakespeare's Hamlet, or Augustine's Confessions, the essays consistently reveal (and revel in) the forbidden."
--Martin Gliserman, Editor of "American Imago"

The psychoanalyst dares to explore the most intimate recesses of the human soul, to throw open long-barred doors, and to confront the forbidden knowledge beneath the surface. In "Freud and Forbidden Knowledge," nine exceptional essays use psychoanalysis to uncover the theme of forbidden knowledge in canonical works of the Western tradition, from the "Bible" to "Hamlet," Psychoanalysis is a discipline that seeks to understand and alleviate human suffering. Its practice is therefore an inherently dangerous activity. The psychoanalyst dares to explore the most intimate recesses of the human soul, to throw open long-barred doors, and to confront the monsters that may lie in wait. In facilitating the patient's process of self- discovery, psychoanalysis concerns forbidden knowledge.

Following Freud's lead, Rudnytsky and Spit approach works of art as constituting psychoanalytic knowledge. Divining that in literature we find the deposits of forbidden knowledge, this collection of nine exceptional essays pursues the theme of forbidden knowledge in canonical works of the Western tradition, from the "Hebrew Bible" to Boccaccio's "The Decameron" to Shakespeare's "Hamlet," These papers pointedly address the canonical status of these works, positing that the canon must be re-visioned in order to recover the history of transgression. "Freud and ForbiddenKnowledge" offers a series of wide-ranging meditations on the tragic dimensions of human experience; cumulatively, they invite reflection on the significance of forbidden knowledge to Freud.

Pink Herrings engages in a re-examination of six of Freud's cases via Lacan's account of sexuation. Specifically, the book outlines a theoretical framework in which sexuation is understood as a 'choice' made in response to the fact of the sexual non relationship. In making this choice, unconscious fantasy allows for the circulation of object a, which bear traces of jouissance. Drawing upon Lacan's distinction between phallic and other jouissance, Pink Herrings examines the four positions outlined in Lacan's formula of sexuation, and maps these onto the six case studies. In so doing, Pink Herrings not only brings new life and insights to the cases, but also clears a path to what is referred to as a 'clinic of sexuation'. Such a clinic would not replace existing Lacanian psychoanalytic practice (with its focus on the structures of neurosis, perversion and psychosis), but instead provide additional avenues through which to explore the operations of fantasy.

When the late Heinz Kohut defined psychoanalysis as the science of empathy and introspection, he sparked a debate that has animated psychoanalytic discourse ever since. What is the relationship of empathy to psychoanalysis? Is it a constituent of analytical technique, an integral aspect of the therapeutic action of analysis, or simply a metaphor for a mode of observation better understood via 'classical' theory and terminology? The dialogue about empathy, which is really a dialogue about the nature of the analytic process, continues in this two-volume set, originally published in 1984. In Volume I, several illuminating attempts to define empathy are followed by Kohut's essay, 'Introspection, Empathy, and the Semicircle of Mental Health.' Kohut's paper, in turn, ushers in a series of original contributions on 'Empathy as a Perspective in Psychoanalysis.' The volume ends with five papers which strive to demarcate an empathic approach to various areas of artistic endeavour, including the appreciation of visual art. Volume II continues the dialogue with a series of developmental studies which explore the role of empathy in early child care at the same time as they chart the emergence of the young child's capacity to empathize. In the concluding section, 'Empathy in Psychoanalytic Work,' contributors and discussants return to the arena of technique. They not only theorize about empathy in relation to analytic understanding and communication, but address issues of nosology, considering how the empathic vantage point may be utilized in the treatment of patients with borderline and schizophrenic pathology. In their critical attention to the many dimensions of empathy - philosophical, developmental, therapeutic, artistic - the contributors collectively bear witness to the fact that Kohut has helped to shape new questions, but not set limits to the search for answers. The product of their efforts is an anatomical exploration of a topic whose relevance for psychoanalysis and psychotherapy is only beginning to be understood.

Originally published in 1983 Reflections on Self Psychology records the development of a powerful initiative to alter psychoanalytic theory and practice, and an evaluative questioning of this initiative. It presents a dialogue that developed at the Boston Symposium of 1980 between vigorous proponents of self psychology, equally energetic critics, and many participants between these polar positions. This book attempts to capture within its pages not only the content of what was presented, explored, and evaluated in Boston, but also a sense of the people, about 1,000 strong, who exchanged their ideas on and off the podium - and the remarkable spirit of open inquiry that invigorated these proceedings. The book, as was the meeting, is organized to explore four subjects: the development of the self: infant research; the implications of self psychology for psychoanalytic practice; self psychology and psychotherapy; and the implications of self psychology for psychoanalytic theory. The final section of the book is devoted to an essay by Heinz Kohut that provides an integrated response to the issues and criticisms raised in the course of the symposium. This essay while based on extemporaneous responses by Kohut during different phases of the meeting, is, in its written version, a cohesive, carefully revised, and edited statement prepared in the mellowing period following the meeting and before Kohut's untimely death.

Michael Eigen is widely regarded as a significant and increasingly influential figure in contemporary psychoanalysis. This collection of papers, by contributors in the USA, Israel, Australia and South Africa, reveal how his works yield creative and generative possibilities with profound clinical and cultural implications. Writers include well-known authors such as Mark Epstein, Anthony Molino and Brent Potter. The papers are divided into three sections: Reflections (psychoanalytic and philosophical concerns, such as Heidegger, the Hindu Goddess Kali, Buddhism, the sense of Time); Refractions (clinical implications, papers on murder and aliveness, the nature of the analytic interaction, addiction and work with the mother-infant relationship), and Responses (personal impacts of his works, as well as poetry and the thoughts of a creative writer on Eigen's oeuvre). There are also papers on the experience of supervision with Michael Eigen as well as on his weekly seminars on Bion, Winnicott and Lacan, ongoing for more than forty years, in New York.

Childhood sexual abuse within the family of origin and society's institutions, such as the church, education, sports, and the world of celebrity, has been neglected as a significant issue by psychoanalysis and society. The incest trauma needs to be understood as one of the most significant problems of contemporary society. This book is an attempt to re-establish incest trauma as a significant psychological disorder by tracing the evolutionary trajectory of psychoanalysis from the Seduction Theory to the Oedipal Therapy to the Confusion of Tongues Theory. By examining the theoretical, emotional, interpersonal, and political issues involved in Freud's abandoning the Seduction Hypothesis and replacing it with the Oedipal Complex, we can see how system building became more important than the emotional welfare of children. In a series of chapters the authors demonstrate this neglect of the incest trauma.

Bion's War Memoirs is perhaps the most exceptional piece of autobiography yet written by a psychoanalyst. The first section of the book is documentary, consisting of the entire text of the diaries which the author wrote as a young man to record his experiences on the Western Front in 1917-1919, and this volume also includes the photographs and diagrams with which he illustrated his recollections. The diaries are followed by two later essays, in which he reflects upon his wartime experiences. The author has long been renowned as one of the great psychoanalysts, his career spanning much of the twentieth century and making him one of the most influential names in the field. The author's war diary, which he kept with him during combat, covered his years fighting in France during the First World War. He was just twenty years old when he began writing it. War Memoirs constitutes the final part of the author's autobiography.

This book presents new insights into Freud's famous "discovery" of the unconscious and the subsequent development of psychoanalytic theories. The authors explore the original context in which these ideas arose and the central debate about mind as matter or something that transcends matter. In the course of this examination, it is demonstrated that Freud was influenced not only by the 19th century scientific milieu, but also by ancient cultures. While it is known that Freud was an avid collector of ancient artifacts and generally interested in these older cultures, this book systematically investigates their profound effect on his thinking and theorizing. Two major influences, Egyptian mythology and Jewish mysticism are analyzed in terms of similarities to Freud's emerging ideas about the mind and its diseases. To further this line of investigation, Bakan supplies an illuminating discussion of what it means to interpret. Taken from the viewpoint that interpretation involves an u