The princess has to die: representing rupture and grief in the narrative of adoption.

The search for a coherent account of one's life and one's origin may become a particularly powerful organizer of fantasy and memory, affect and conflict, self and object representation in adopted children. Yet relinquishment, unacknowledged affects, and inaccessible history create a rupture in the fabric of that narrative. Clinical material is presented to illustrate the impact such disruptions may have on the personal narrative and the developing selfhood of the child, with a particular focus on the impact of inhibited mourning.

Psychoanalytic developmental theory: a contemporary reconsideration.

Psychoanalytic developmental theory has never enjoyed a broad consensus among psychoanalytic thinkers. In today's postmodern era, its relevance and basic premises are even more in question as a legitimate part of psychoanalytic theorizing. Part of the problem has been (1) the serious errors perpetrated historically in the name of psychoanalytic developmental theory and (2) its current state of disarray in the wake of piecemeal efforts to rectify these errors.

Do children get better when we interpret their defenses against painful feelings?

This paper represents a step toward trying to integrate clinical and research perspectives. To achieve this integration, analysts need to be clear about the clinical constructs and specific interventions they utilize as they try to unpack the concept of "therapeutic action. "In trying to understand "how" interventions work, technical interventions need to be clinically formulated in a narrow fashion within the more global therapeutic approach in which the particular analyst practices.

Therapeutic action in modern conflict theory.

Recognizing that principles of psychoanalytic technique and conceptions of the analytic treatment process follow from the theory of therapeutic action to which they are linked, the author notes the difficulty of coming up with such a theory in relation to modern conflict theory. After reviewing Freud's initial descriptions of psychoanalytic theory and technique, as well as his later elaborations and modifications, the author summarizes the contributions of Freud's analytic contemporaries and traces the emergence of later theoretical variability in the field. He then presents an overview of recent developments in the theory of therapeutic action, discussing in particular the contributions of Arlow, Brenner, and Gray.

Conceptualizing transformations in child and adult psychoanalysis.

A study group on Conceptualizing Transformation in Child and Adult Analysis focused on a particular kind of change in analysis, that of transformational change, a change in organization that could not be predicted from what came before. We found that, based on careful presentations of four analytic cases, transformational or pre-transformational change did take place. A central intervening variable was the patient's development of a sense of agency.

Absence, ambiguity, and the representation of creativity in Vermeer's The Art of Painting.

This paper examines The Art of Painting, by Johannes Vermeer, to demonstrate how a great artist portrays the realm of imagination and creativity. The crucial points of entry for psychoanalysis reside in two sets of details in the painting that have generally been neglected by art historians: first, the contrast between the realistic rendering of certain parts of the work and the fuzzy, ambiguous nature of other elements; and second, the pervasiveness of the theme of absence in the manifest content. The author refers to some of Winnicott's and Lacan's concepts, particularly the connection between absence and desire as a spur to creativity.

The vicissitudes of aggression in a toddler: a clinical contribution.

Clinical material from the analyses of young children may be particularly useful in understanding the vicissitudes of the aggressive drive. In this paper, the psychoanalytic work with Teddy, a boy with aggressive and angry behavior, is presented to illustrate several important, intertwining and determining factors involved in the expression of his aggressive drive. These include traumatic events, his relationship with his parents and his dread of the strength of his instincts.

"Freud" and Bullitt: an unknown manuscript.

An English translation of a previously unknown manuscript by Freud is presented. The manuscript, originally prepared in 1931 for William Bullitt's psychobiography of Woodrow Wilson, provides a general theoretical introduction to psychoanalysis. It also includes an original interpretation of Christianity that postulates a deep-going continuity between Christ identification and latent homosexuality.

Psychoanalysis in conjunction with medication: a clinical research opportunity.

The increasingly common practice of introducing medication into the analytic relationship is of practical and theoretical concern to analysts. Pharmacological agents and their somatic effects, it is argued, may be seen as a research equivalent to brain lesions, long favored tools in correlating brain with mind function, while psychoanalytic process data may be seen as a fine-tuned instrument for studying the subjective and emotional processes that reflect the underlying brain effect. A method of naturalistic study of psychoanalytic process both with and without a psychopharmacological agent is described and illustrated in two patients.

Thoughts on medication and psychoanalysis: a lay analyst's view.

The issues involved in split analytic treatments-where a second person manages the patient's medication-are discussed from the point of view of a developmentalist and lay analyst. Case material is presented to illustrate the interplay of medication with other elements of the psychoanalytic situation. Medication and its effects, it is argued, should be accorded no special status apart from other interventions and enactments in an analysis.

Further reflections on the "watched" play state and the role of "watched play" in analytic work.

This paper expands upon the concept of "watched play," a play state in which the mother silently but attentively watches her child play. The regulatory presence of the "watching mother" is introjected and internalized through the child's development of mental representations of mother's latently interactive presence, contributing to the development of self-regulatory mechanisms. By contrast, the consequences of failed "watched play" are disorganizing play disruptions which foster ambivalence and affect disregulation.

An analysis of a developmentally delayed young girl. Coordinating analytic and developmental processes.

Clinical material is presented from a multi-year treatment of a five-year-old girl with a variety of developmental interferences, making it necessary to consider whether standard technique would suffice. History includes the fact that she was adopted five days after birth and told as early as possible about her adoption; she was placed in a restrictive brace from four months to twenty months because of congenital hip displasia. Sandy's ability to let in the outside world was limited by her intense denial, not looking, not taking in, and by her detachment.

Mothers' ambivalence with their babies and toddlers: manifestations of conflicts with aggression.

In this paper the author continues his study of conflicts over aggression in women, discussing the implications for contemporary theories of feminine psychology of observations of mothers in parent/child groups with their infants and toddlers. Many mothers experience conflicts over aggression (both in themselves and in their children) and become intolerant of their ambivalence toward their children. The author suggests that this observation provides an avenue that allows an integration of psychoanalytic ideas about maternity and childrearing with psychoanalytic understandings of women's conflicts about achievement in the social realm outside the home.

The course of 253 analyses from selection to outcome.

Two studies of the clinical work of experienced psychoanalysts are presented. Study I is a retrospective study of all the analytic work--161 cases--of sixteen analysts from 1973 to 1977, including their evaluations of the treatments at outcome. Study II is a prospective study of the ninety-two cases started in analysis by a group of twenty analysts between 1984 and 1989 and followed to termination, including their reports.

The superego. Its formation, structure, and functioning.

In this paper the theory of the superego is explored from the point of view of ego psychology. It traces the historical background in Freud's original contributions and the more contemporary understanding of the forces at work in the formation of this new psychic structure as they come together at a unique point in development, the oedipal phase. Superego functions are delineated, and precursors of superego functioning are differentiated from the functioning of the superego proper.

Flaubert and Madame Bovary: an intimate courtship.

The process by which Gustave Flaubert created the character of Emma Bovary is examined, as are various of the author's sources for the heroine and their transformation in the course of composing the novel. Certain aspects of the authors psychic makeup, including his bisexuality, are discussed in this light, as are Flaubert's early traumatic losses and their influence on his way of working. Finally, it is suggested that writing had multiple functions for the author and that the creation of Emma Bovary served as a partial solution to unmet needs.

James Joyce and Molly Bloom: reflections on their relationship.

The relationship between James Joyce and his memorable creation, Molly Bloom, is explored in relation to Joyce's remarkable creativity and various factors that may have contributed to it. A character forged primarily out of Joyce's perceptions of his wife Nora and memories of his mother, Molly also contains aspects of Joyce's warded-off and wished-for self-representation. A focus on both biographical and dynamic contributions to the creation of Molly helps to illuminate aspects of Joyce's psychology.

Magic and the aesthetic illusion.

The aesthetic illusion is the subjective experience that the content of a work of art is reality. It has an intrinsic relation to magic, an intrapsychic maneuver oriented toward modification and control of the extraspyschic world, principally through ego functioning. Magic is ontogenetically and culturally archaic, expresses the omnipotence inherent in primary narcissism, and operates according to the logic of the primary process.