Psychoanalysis With Wilfred R Bion

Psychoanalysis with Wilfred R. Bion is the product of François Lévy's efforts over a period of twenty years to represent clearly the classical elements and the innovatory propositions of the thought and work of Bion, who offers both new and modified ways of practising and thinking about the psychoanalytic experience. Bion's thought, methodical and intuitive, gave rise to profound modifications in the approach to the psychology of groups, clinical work with psychoses, and the conception of the genesis of thought. Some of his original notions - psychic growth, processes of thinking, transformations, alpha function, maternal reverie - constitute valuable tools for rethinking psychoanalytic practice. This book places Bion's thought within a filiation that is faithful to those of Sigmund Freud and Melanie Klein. It shows the parallels that exist between Bion's formalisations and those of Lacan. It also lays emphasis on the mechanisms of thought arising from the negative (André Green), from logic (Lewis Carroll), from causalist philosophy (David Hume), from literature (Milton, Blanchot) and from the physical sciences (Stephen Hawking). Finally, Lévy underlines the importance of placing individuals within the collective from which they have originated. Psychoanalysis with Wilfred R. Bion will appeal to psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists looking to draw on the ideas of one of the most important and influential figures in the history of psychoanalysis.

Elements of Psycho-Analysis is a 20-chapter text that describes the phenomena whose various aspects can be seen to fall within the grid categories of psycho-analysis. The elements of psycho-analysis are ideas and feelings as represented by their setting in a single grid-category. The opening chapters deal with the psychoanalytic objects, which are associations and interpretations with extensions in the domain of sense, myth, and passion. The remaining chapters are extensive discussions of the psychoanalytic phenomena, including ideas, feelings, pain, association and interpretation, conflicting pairs, and the two axes of grid. This book is directed primarily to psycho-analysts and psychiatrists.

Second Thoughts is a collection of papers on Schizophrenia, Linking and Thinking, and is a commentary upon them in the light of later work. Originally composed between 1950 and 1962, it derives its title from the lengthy critical commentary which Bion attached to these case histories in the year of publication, 1967, and represents the evolutionary change of position marked in his three previous books and brought to further refinement in the present work.

Transformations continues the investigation of various aspects of psychoanalytic theory and practice which the author commenced with Learning from Experience (1962) and pursued in Elements of Psychoanalysis (1963). In this third work published in 1965, the author examines the ways in which the analyst's description of the original analytic experience, mediated by theory, necessarily transforms it in the course of effecting an interpretation.

Wilfred Bion's unpublished lectures at the Los Angeles Psychoanalytic Society and Institute in April in 1967 represent a unique opportunity for students either new to or continuing in the study of the author's unique psychoanalytic vertex. Here one can both read - and hear - the author's clear exposition of his clinical and theoretical thinking to an audience of primarily Freudian trained American analysts, most of whom were new to his ideas. The first lecture sets out the author's ideas on 'memory and desire' in a paper that set the benchmark in the origins of contemporary Kleinian clinical technique. The author discusses the various factors that facilitate optimal listening receptivity in the analyst, for example how one differentiates the 'K' link vis-a-vis 'transformations in O.' In the second lecture, the author defined projective identification, container/contained and 'beta elements'- and how these ideas serve as an orienting template for the analyst's understanding of 'proto-mental' states of mind, either in psychotic, borderline or neurotic patients. He clarifies these ideas while engaging with the queries of renowned American analysts, such as Ralph Greenson.

Psychoanalysis with Wilfred R. Bion is the product of François Lévy’s efforts over a period of twenty years to represent clearly the classical elements and the innovatory propositions of the thought and work of Bion, who offers both new and modified ways of practising and thinking about the psychoanalytic experience. Bion’s thought, methodical and intuitive, gave rise to profound modifications in the approach to the psychology of groups, clinical work with psychoses, and the conception of the genesis of thought. Some of his original notions – psychic growth, processes of thinking, transformations, alpha function, maternal reverie – constitute valuable tools for rethinking psychoanalytic practice. This book places Bion’s thought within a filiation that is faithful to those of Sigmund Freud and Melanie Klein. It shows the parallels that exist between Bion’s formalisations and those of Lacan. It also lays emphasis on the mechanisms of thought arising from the negative (André Green), from logic (Lewis Carroll), from causalist philosophy (David Hume), from literature (Milton, Blanchot) and from the physical sciences (Stephen Hawking). Finally, Lévy underlines the importance of placing individuals within the collective from which they have originated. Psychoanalysis with Wilfred R. Bion will appeal to psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists looking to draw on the ideas of one of the most important and influential figures in the history of psychoanalysis.

The Italian Seminars, previously unpublished in English, comprises lectures W.R. Bion gave in Rome, in 1977. The volume consists of questions from the floor and Bion's fascinating and, at times, controversial answers. The lectures are divided in two: the first part was organized by the Italian Psychoanalytical Society and the second by the Via Pollaiolo Research Group. Bion's replies examine such diverse subjects as difficulties in the interaction between the therapist and the patient; music and psychoanalysis; non-verbal communication in the consulting room; and methodology in psychoanalysis.

Wilfred Bion was one of the most original and influential thinkers in recent psychoanalysis. His ideas, which can be traced in direct line in the development of psychoanalytic theory from Freud to Melanie Klein, are difficult to grasp because his writing style was often enigmatic and ambiguous. This is the first full biography and the first comprehensive explication of his significant contribution to psychoanalytic theory and practice. Dr. Bleandonu takes us through Bion's personal and intellectual explorations and gives clear accounts of his key concepts, including work groups and basic assumption groups, psychotic processes, catastrophic change, abandonment of memory and desire, the mystic, and ultimate truth. In addition, the grid is carefully laid out and explicated; the emergence of the idea of links, and attacks on them, as a core theme for the rest of Bion's working life is given proper attention; and Bion's attempt to creat an extensive psychoanalytic epistemology is discusses. Finally Bleandonu guides the reader through the fantasy writings in Memoir of the Future, the masterpiece that is Bion's autobiography, and his final writings, including the posthumous Cogitations. Significant reading for anyone with an interest in psychoanalysis, psychotherapy, and the development of psychoanalytic thought, this volume will be valued by professionals and students alike.