840 Pages 2 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    840 Pages 2 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    How has psychoanalysis developed in France in the years since Lacan so dramatically polarized the field?

    In this book, Dana Birksted-Breen and Sara Flanders of the British Psychoanalytical Society, and Alain Gibeault of the Paris Psychoanalytical Society provide an overview of how French psychoanalysis has developed since Lacan. Focusing primarily on the work of psychoanalysts from the French Psychoanalytical Association and from the Paris Psychoanalytical Society, the two British psychoanalysts view the evolution of theory as it appears to them from the outside, while the French psychoanalyst explains and elaborates from inside the French psychoanalytic discourse. Seminal and representative papers have been chosen to illuminate what is special about French thinking. A substantial general introduction argues in favour of the specificity of 'French psychoanalysis', tracing its early influences and highlighting specific contemporary developments.

    Sections are made up of introductory material by Alain Gibeault, followed by illustrative papers in the following categories:

    • the history of psychoanalysis in France
    • the pioneers and their legacy
    • the setting and the process of psychoanalysis
    • phantasy and representation
    • the body and the drives
    • masculine and feminine sexuality
    • psychosis.

    An excellent introduction to French psychoanalytical debate, Reading French Psychoanalysis sheds a complementary light on thinking that has evolved differently in England and North America. It will be ideal reading for beginners and advanced students of clinical theory as well as experienced psychoanalysts wanting to know more about French Psychoanalytic theory, and how it has developed.

    Birksted-Breen, Flanders, General Introduction. Section I: History of Psychoanalysis in France. de Mijolla, Some Distinctive Features of the History of Psychoanalysis in France (2004). Widlöcher, What Has Become of the Lines of Advance in Psychoanalysis? The Evolution of Practices in France (2001). Section II: The Pioneers and Their Legacy. Lacan, The Mirror Stage as Formative of the Function of the I as Revealed in Psychoanalytic Experience (1949). Bouvet, Technical Variation and the Concept of Distance (1958). Nacht, The Non-Verbal Relationship in Psycho-Analytic Treatment (1957). Section III: The Setting and the Process of Psychoanalysis. Donnet, From the Fundamental Rule to the Analysing Situation (2001). Diatkine, Preliminary Remarks on the Present State of Psychoanalysis of Children (1972). Grunberger, Narcissistic Aspects of the Analytic Situation (1977). de M’Uzan, The Uncanny or ‘I Am Not Who You Think I Am’ (2007). Viderman, The Role of the Countertransference (1982). Neyraut, Countertransference and Psychoanalytic Thought (1974). Laplanche, Transference: Its Provocation by the Analyst (1992). Rolland, Speaking and Renouncing (2008). Section IV: Phantasy and Representation. Lebovici, Object Relationships in Children (1961). Laplanche, Pontalis, Fantasy and the Origins of Sexuality (1964). Fain, The Prelude to Fantasmatic Life (1971). Green, The Work of the Negative (1986). Negative Hallucination (1993). Botella, Botella, Working as a Double (1995). Torok, The Illness of Mourning and the Fantasy of the Exquisite Corpse (1968). Faimberg, Listening to the Telescoping of Generations: The Psychoanalytic Pertinence of the Concept (1988). Kristeva, 'Speech in Psychoanalysis': From Symbols to the Flesh and Back (2007). Section V: The Body and the Drives. Marty, de M’Uzan, Operational Thinking (1963). Marty, Essential Depression (1968). Aisenstein, Psychosomatic Solution or Somatic Outcome: The Man from Burma - Psychotherapy of a Case of Haemorrhagic Rectocolitis (1993). Anzieu, Functions of the Skin Ego (1985). Green, The Death Drive: Meaning, Objections, Substitutes (2007). Rosenberg, (Erotogenic) Masochism and the Pleasure Principle (1982). Roussillon, Sexualisation and Desexualisation in Psychoanalysis (2004). Diatkine, The Croatian Cravat: The Narcissism of Small Differences and the Process of Civilisation (1993). Section VI: Masculine and Feminine Sexuality. Chasseguet-Smirgel, Feminine Guilt and the Oedipus Complex (1964). Cournut, Poor Men - Or Why Men are Afraid of Women (1998). Cournut-Janin, The Feminine and Femininity (1998). Denis, Primary Homosexuality: A Foundation of Contradictions (1982). David, The Beautiful Differences (1973). McDougall, Plea for a Measure of Abnormality (1978). Section VII: Psychosis. Pasche, The Shield of Perseus or Psychosis and Reality (1971). Kestemberg, The Fetishistic Object-Relationship: Some Observations (1978). Racamier, Suffering and Surviving in Paradoxes (1991). Aulagnier, Retreat into Hallucination: An Equivalent of the Autistic Retreat? (1985). Gibeault, Schizophrenia and Psychodrama: Psychoanalytic Psychodrama with 'John', the Man 'Saddled with That/the Id' (2008).

    Biography

    Dana Birksted-Breen is a Training and Supervising Psychoanalyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society. She is the General Editor of the New Library of Psychoanalysis and the Joint Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Psychoanalysis.

    Sara Flanders is a Training and Supervising Psychoanalyst of the British Psychoanalytical Society.

    Alain Gibeault is a Training and Supervising Psychoanalyst of the Paris Psychoanalytical Society and Director of the E. & J. Kestemberg Centre for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy.

    "...a useful tool for US psychologists and psychoanalyists eager for a stimulating encounter with the work of our French colleagues. Indeed, this rich and beautifully edited compendium is that, and even more, but with a twist: It is an encyclopedic sourcebook, and tremendously useful summary and synthesis, of the history of psychoanalysis in France, but not the French psychoanalysis most US readers will expect...masterfully and accessibly written...When important ideas find effective expression, nothing is ever the same again - a touchstone belief in our work. Thus the pleasure of introducing colleagues to this volume is considerable, a disruptive and impassioned desire." - Richard Ruth and Idith Kahn, DIVISION/Review Vol.1 No.1

    "I find Reading French Psychoanalysis to be the single best introduction we have to French psychoanalytic thinking so far. All involved in bringing this book to fruition deserve congratulations. In whatever format, one hopes it will go on to reach a new generation of English-speaking psychoanalysts." The Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 2014

    “It is a book that will challenge many American readers intellectually, even relentlessly. It tells the story of a psychoanalytic universe that evolved from ruins of the Second World War into a generative culture mixing classicism and innovation in the 1980s and ’90s.” -Eric Glassgold, MD, Psychiatrist