The Individual and Society's Institutions (N.M. Szajnberg). Psychoanalysis and the Classroom (B. Cohler, R. GalatzerLevy). A History of Milieu in the Residential Treatment of Children and Youth (J. Noshpitz). Orthodoxy and Heresy in the History of Psychoanalysis (E. Frattaroli). Bettelheim's Contribution to Anthropology (R. Paul). From the Orthogenic School to the Reservation (R. Bergman). Secrecy and Privacy in a Psychodynamic Milieu (N.M. Szajnberg). Index.

How did we develop our current views of inner life? Psychic Mimesis From Bible and Homer to the Present: Inner Life Over Time reaches back to Biblical and Homeric times, then sweeps across over two millennia of Western literature to answer this question. We discover that while there are discrete contributions from different eras/cultures about inner life—volition, ego ideal, superego, development as a journey, relatedness, even the fact of innerness—there are also at least three trends that have endured from the beginning of our literature and continue as ostinatos beneath each theme and variation of development. These are emotions and our need to conceal and reveal secrets and attachment that is our ability to explore from a secure base. This book takes us through the journey of discovery to arrive at our twenty-first century sense of self and inner life. We follow Auerbach’s text, Mimesis, as a guide through the literature, but add surprises such as Maimonides’ Guide to the perplexed or Rousseau’s Confessions to arrive at the sense that while there are particularities to eras and cultures, there is also something universal that resonates with us and endures.

Follow seventy-six children from birth to thirty to learn about their various developmental life paths and their influences. Children traverse continuous or discontinuous courses. This book describes their life stories, which may transform and enrich the reader's life. In working with these people, the authors heard something basic: stories people tell about themselves. While a life may fall into a group - share characteristics with others - the individual's story remains compelling: to group people is to some degree against psychoanalysis, a humanizing discipline. The authors allow the subjects to speak at length in their own voices, to bring themselves alive for the reader. It is the authors hope that they have been able to convey their awe about watching the inner worlds of children and that these stories may evolve in readers minds and hearts and thus be remembered.