1st Edition
Clinical Encounters and the Lacanian Analyst "Who's your Dora?"
Clinical Encounters and the Lacanian Analyst presents interviews with Lacanian analysts, exploring their professional development and the effects that their patients have had on them.
Dries Dulsster interviews leading Lacanian psychoanalysts, asking them for insights on the formative effects of working with their analysands. By asking "Who's your Dora?", Dulsster invites the interviewees to reflect on the patients who have changed their practice or influenced the development of key theories.
Clinical Encounters and the Lacanian Analyst will be of great interest to practicing and training Lacanian analysts, as well as to Lacanian scholars and academics.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS. INTRODUCTION: "WHO’S YOUR DORA?" 2. PAUL VERHAEGHE – REMARKS THAT RESONATE 3. - STIJN VANHEULE – ENCOUNTERING A ZEN-BUDDHIST MASTER 4. EVI VERBEKE – THEORY TO PRACTICE 5. AMAR EL-OMARI – THE AWAKENING OF A CLINICIAN 6. ANNIE ROGERS – THE UNCONSCIOUS SIGNS ITS LETTERS 7. STEPHANIE SWALES – UNTRODDED GROUNDS 8. KRISTEN HENNESSY – YOU CAN’T DO IT ALONE 9. PATRICIA GHEROVICI – A COURAGEOUS ENDEAVOR 10. JAMIESON WEBSTER – THINGS WE DON’T TALK ABOUT 11. THE DORA-EFFECT AND THE FORMATION OF THE PSYCHOANALYST
Biography
Dries G. M. Dulsster is Internship Coordinator and Educational Supervisor at the Department of Psychoanalysis and Clinical Consulting, Ghent University, Belgium. He works as a psychoanalyst in a private practice and is Editor in Chief of the Psychoanalytische Perspectieven.
"In his postscript to The Question of Lay Analysis, Freud famously stated that a psychoanalyst cannot treat a patient without learning something new. And indeed, it would not be an exaggeration to say that it was the young woman Freud called ‘Dora’ who taught him about the importance of transference. In this riveting set of frank interviews with an international cast of practicing psychoanalysts, which is bookended by two contextualising reflections, Dulsster uses this ‘Dora-principle’ to ask his interlocutors about the patients who helped shape their own clinical work. The result is a truly original and invariably fascinating series of reflections on how all psychoanalysts come to reinvent clinical practice for themselves by virtue of their patients. This book is essential reading for trainees and established clinicians alike, across the spectrum of mental health care providers." Dany Nobus, Professor of Psychoanalytic Psychology, Brunel University London, UK; Founding Scholar, British Psychoanalytic Council
"At last(!), a compelling ‘spoken’ account of Lacanian clinical work which relies on the verbal interchange rather than on theoretical exposition in order to re-orient us regards fundamental psychoanalytic concepts. In an inspired move, Dulsster invites many of the most renowned Lacanian practitioners onto the couch so as to reflect on their formative experiences as clinicians. What emerges is an essential account of the idiosyncrasies underlying psychoanalytic formation and of the singularity of what it means to truly listen to those who enter the analytic situation." Derek Hook, Associate Professor of Psychology, Duquesne University, USA; co-editor of the Reading Lacan’s Ecrits series; and author of Six Moments in Lacan (both Routledge)
"Clinical Encounters and the Lacanian Analyst is an inspiring text for both new and seasoned psychoanalysts. With an exquisite light touch, Dulsster interviews nine practitioners who generously offer their clinical resourcefulness and dexterity, as well as share fertile moments of speech effects for both the patient and the analyst, including those of failure, in cases that are significant to their own formation. The book shows how patients teach analysts to be better analysts. It demystifies Lacanian practice, highlights its diversity, and demonstrates its power and relevance in any healthcare setting. Once you pick up this book, you won't be able to put it down. It's a great read!" Eve Watson, psychoanalyst, Dublin, Ireland; co-editor of Critical Essays on the Drive: Lacanian Theory and Practice (Routledge)
