On the Dialectics of Psychoanalytic Practice

Arriving when new psychoanalytic concerns - narcissism, borderline - were dislodging the hegemony of American ego psychology, but equally consonant with emergent gay, decolonial, and counter-cultural critique, Morgenthaler's deftly subversive clinical lectures for psychoanalysts in Zurich in 1974 create extraordinary space for cultural leverage, now as then. Here is an eye for the needs of outsiders, a psychoanalysis without fixed goals, relational before its time, seeking above all to set an emotional process in motion, one which might, through 'revolutionary psychic turbulence', foster changes that could make all the difference. As Dagmar Herzog puts it, this is not just a tool for psychoanalytic learning, but a manifesto for nonfascist existence. - MATT FFYTCHE, Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex The psychoanalytic contributions of Fritz Morgenthaler, widely admired and idealized in Europe, are mostly unknown in the US. Notably, he was a pioneering contributor to rethinking psychoanalysis' pathologization of same-sex feelings, behaviors and relationships. This new edited translation of Morgenthaler's lectures on psychoanalytic technique is compelling and accessible. Technik should prove a valuable read to historians, students and seasoned practitioners of psychoanalysis. - JACK DRESCHER, MD, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Columbia University Fritz Morgenthaler's Technik is a call for the continued relevance of psychoanalysis to understand not only the self, but also broader social and political phenomena. These lectures and supplemental texts will be essential to anyone interested in the potential of psychoanalysis to offer a systematic critique of social normativity (especially in the domain of sexuality). - CAMILLE ROBCIS, author of The Law of Kinship: Anthropology, Psychoanalysis, and the Law in France Arriving when new psychoanalytic concerns - narcissism, borderline - were dislodging the hegemony of American ego psychology, but equally consonant with emergent gay, decolonial, and counter-cultural critique, Morgenthaler's deftly subversive clinical lectures for psychoanalysts in Zurich in 1974 create extraordinary space for cultural leverage, now as then. Here is an eye for the needs of outsiders, a psychoanalysis without fixed goals, relational before its time, seeking above all to set an emotional process in motion, one which might, through 'revolutionary psychic turbulence', foster changes that could make all the difference. As Dagmar Herzog puts it, this is not just a tool for psychoanalytic learning, but a manifesto for nonfascist existence. - MATT FFYTCHE, Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex The psychoanalytic contributions of Fritz Morgenthaler, widely admired and idealized in Europe, are mostly unknown in the US. Notably, he was a pioneering contributor to rethinking psychoanalysis' pathologization of same-sex feelings, behaviors and relationships. This new edited translation of Morgenthaler's lectures on psychoanalytic technique is compelling and accessible. On the Dialectics of Psychoanalytic Practice should prove a valuable read to historians, students and seasoned practitioners of psychoanalysis. - JACK DRESCHER, MD, Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Columbia University Fritz Morgenthaler's work is a call for the continued relevance of psychoanalysis to understand not only the self, but also broader social and political phenomena. These lectures and supplemental texts will be essential to anyone interested in the potential of psychoanalysis to offer a systematic critique of social normativity (especially in the domain of sexuality). - CAMILLE ROBCIS, author of The Law of Kinship: Anthropology, Psychoanalysis, and the Law in France