Psychic Retreats

Essentially clinical in its approach, Psychic Retreats discusses the problem of patients who are ''stuck'' and with whom it is difficult to make meaningful contact. John Steiner, an experienced psychoanalyst, uses new developments in Kleinian theory to explain how this happens.

He examines the way object relationships and defences can be organized into complex structures which lead to a personality and an analysis becoming rigid and stuck, with little opportunity for development or change. These systems of defences are pathological organisations of the personality: John Steiner describes them as ''psychic retreats'', into which the patient can withdraw to avoid contact both with the analyst and with reality.

To provide a background to these original and controversial concepts, the author builds on more established ideas such as Klein''s distinction between the paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions, and briefly reviews previous work on pathological organizat