Plea for a Measure of Abnormality

Inbunden bok. International Universities Press, Inc. 2:a uppl. 1982. 500 sidor.

Mycket gott skick. Skyddsomslag i hyggligt skick. Ägarsignatur på försättsbladet. Språk: Engelska. "It is a rare event for a psychoanalyst to plead for a measure of abnormality as a sign of psychic health; but it is perhaps even more rare to encounter a psychoanalyst who is willing to put into question, over and beyond his analytic skills, his identity as an analyst. Yet it is those patients who confront the analyst with their power to render his work difficult or even sterile, who particularly interest Joyce McDougall. Unlike the 'good classical neurotic', these patients are all too rapidly dubbed character neurotics, perverts, psychosomatics, or narcissistic personalities. If the analyst can allow himself to feel and reveal their suffering, then the psychoanalytic experience can touch the limits of what is analyzable, representable and narratable. It is on this terrain, where one must continually invent new ways of making contact and communicating, that the author with her exceptional freedom of thought and style conducts the reader. In summing up the central theme of this psychoanalytic voyage, the author writes: 'If the child hidden within each adult is the cause of his mental suffering, this child is also the source of art and of the poetry of life. On his continuing existence rests the promise of a fresh perception of the world, the revelation of unsuspected mystery in the everyday scene, and the maintenance of a personal and private folly to offset the deadening specter of normative normality. It is the task of each of us to know how to keep in touch with the magical and narcissistic child within".