Classics in Psychoanalytic Technique

This book is a reader in psychoanalytic technique, broadly con-
ceived. It collects under one cover what are in my opinion the most
important and innovative investigations of the therapeutic relation-
ship, interaction, setting, and experience ever to issue from the
pens of psychoanalysts. In assembling them here, it is my wish to
provide mental health practitioners of all persuasions the oppor-
tunity to read and study these now classic contributions. It is my
belief that all true progress in the field must base itself on the ques-
tions and insights of these pioneers, even as many of their formula-
tions are improved, elaborated, and finally surpassed.
In many ways, the present volume is an outgrowth of The Thera-
peutic Interaction (Langs 1976b), a work in which I abstracted over
five hundred articles on this same subject, and then analyzed, criti-
cized, and discussed the implications of that literature for both
psychoanalytic theory and all types of therapeutic technique. All
but a few of the papers included here were included in those vol-
umes; as a result, the brief commentaries that I have prepared for
each major section of this book, and for each individual paper, have
been designed with conciseness and immediate perspective in
mind. The interested reader will find far more extended critiques in
the earlier book.