Chris Mawson – författare

Psychoanalysis and Anxiety: From Knowing to Being combines psychoanalytic, existential and dramaturgical perspectives on the study of anxiety.

The book explores the implications for psychoanalysis of including a consideration of the being of the patient, and of the analyst. The central principle throughout is that the psychoanalytic and the existential belong together since it is the irreducible fact of anxiety that unifies them. It is in relation to anxiety that we are helped by other human beings to bear what is, and what we are.

Divided into four sections, the book begins with the distinction made in antiquity between anxiety and fear, before discussing its treatment by philosophers such as Heidegger, who regarded anxiety as the mood most disclosive of our being, and Kierkegaard, who distinguished between fear and angst. The book then explores how anxiety has been understood by major psychoanalytic theorists, including Freud, Klein, Winnicott and Bion, before a third part discusses how key principles of drama relate to therapeutic practice and theory, including a re-evaluation of the concept of catharsis, as well as Brecht’s concept of making strange the familiar. The pursuit of insightful knowledge in psychoanalysis is reconsidered in the book’s concluding section, with a shift of emphasis from psychoanalytic interpretations as statements of knowing to interpretive activity as a continuous process of becoming informed.

This insightful and wide-ranging volume will fascinate practising psychoanalysts and psychotherapists, anyone working in mental health, as well as scholars of philosophy and theatre.

Psychoanalysis and Anxiety: From Knowing to Being combines psychoanalytic, existential and dramaturgical perspectives on the study of anxiety.

The book explores the implications for psychoanalysis of including a consideration of the being of the patient, and of the analyst. The central principle throughout is that the psychoanalytic and the existential belong together since it is the irreducible fact of anxiety that unifies them. It is in relation to anxiety that we are helped by other human beings to bear what is, and what we are.

Divided into four sections, the book begins with the distinction made in antiquity between anxiety and fear, before discussing its treatment by philosophers such as Heidegger, who regarded anxiety as the mood most disclosive of our being, and Kierkegaard, who distinguished between fear and angst. The book then explores how anxiety has been understood by major psychoanalytic theorists, including Freud, Klein, Winnicott and Bion, before a third part discusses how key principles of drama relate to therapeutic practice and theory, including a re-evaluation of the concept of catharsis, as well as Brecht’s concept of making strange the familiar. The pursuit of insightful knowledge in psychoanalysis is reconsidered in the book’s concluding section, with a shift of emphasis from psychoanalytic interpretations as statements of knowing to interpretive activity as a continuous process of becoming informed.

This insightful and wide-ranging volume will fascinate practising psychoanalysts and psychotherapists, anyone working in mental health, as well as scholars of philosophy and theatre.

Three Papers of W.R. Bion features two previously unpublished papers and one which has only previously appeared in The Complete Works of W. R. Bion (2014). Characterised by Bion’s directness, clarity and intensity, together they illustrate important aspects of his later thinking. They also show Bion using his key ideas in fresh contexts which will allow readers already familiar with his theoretical and clinical concepts to appreciate them from a new angle.

The first paper, Memory and Desire, clarifies one of Bion’s most important and clinically-relevant ideas: the value of suspending elements of our memory and desire in the service of allowing openness to psychoanalytic intuition. The second, Negative Capability, was reformulated to become the final chapter of his 1970 Attention and Interpretation. The publication here of the original paper allows an interesting and rewarding three-way comparison to be made with the 1970 chapter, and Memory and Desire. The third paper, Break Up, Break Down, Break Through, was presented without notes in 1976 in Los Angeles and the transcript from the recorded talk is published here for the first time. It displays the complex interweaving of the personal and the theoretical and offers a fascinating contribution to the study of what Bion called "the turbulence that obeys no man-made ‘laws of nature’".

Wilfred R. Bion’s writing continues to be read and re-read by an increasing and widening readership; the three papers presented here possess contemporary clinical relevance and each have a bearing on the underlying philosophical basis of psychoanalytical work and thinking.

Three Papers of W.R. Bion features two previously unpublished papers and one which has only previously appeared in The Complete Works of W. R. Bion (2014). Characterised by Bion’s directness, clarity and intensity, together they illustrate important aspects of his later thinking. They also show Bion using his key ideas in fresh contexts which will allow readers already familiar with his theoretical and clinical concepts to appreciate them from a new angle.

The first paper, Memory and Desire, clarifies one of Bion’s most important and clinically-relevant ideas: the value of suspending elements of our memory and desire in the service of allowing openness to psychoanalytic intuition. The second, Negative Capability, was reformulated to become the final chapter of his 1970 Attention and Interpretation. The publication here of the original paper allows an interesting and rewarding three-way comparison to be made with the 1970 chapter, and Memory and Desire. The third paper, Break Up, Break Down, Break Through, was presented without notes in 1976 in Los Angeles and the transcript from the recorded talk is published here for the first time. It displays the complex interweaving of the personal and the theoretical and offers a fascinating contribution to the study of what Bion called "the turbulence that obeys no man-made ‘laws of nature’".

Wilfred R. Bion’s writing continues to be read and re-read by an increasing and widening readership; the three papers presented here possess contemporary clinical relevance and each have a bearing on the underlying philosophical basis of psychoanalytical work and thinking.

The Complete Works of W. R. Bion is now available in a coherent and corrected format. Comprising sixteen volumes bound in green cloth, this edition has been brought together and edited by Chris Mawson with the assistance of Francesca Bion. Incorporating many corrections to previously published works, it also features previously unpublished papers. Including a general index and editorial introductions to all the works, these volumes will be a useful and valuable aid to psychoanalytic scholars and clinicians, and all those interested in studying and making use of Bion''s thinking.Bion''s writings, including the previously unpublished papers and additions to his Cogitations, collected together in the Complete Works, show that the clinical thrust of Bion''s work has clear lines of continuity with that of Melanie Klein, just as her work has an essential continuity with the later work of Freud. In Bion''s clinical work and supervision the goal remains insightful understanding of psychic reality through a disciplined experiencing of the transference and countertransference; the setting and the method - however much Bion''s terminology might suggest otherwise - remains rigorously psychoanalytic.

The Complete Works of W. R. Bion is now available in a coherent and corrected format. Comprising sixteen volumes bound in green cloth, this edition has been brought together and edited by Chris Mawson with the assistance of Francesca Bion. Incorporating many corrections to previously published works, it also features previously unpublished papers. Including a general index and editorial introductions to all the works, these volumes will be a useful and valuable aid to psychoanalytic scholars and clinicians, and all those interested in studying and making use of Bion''s thinking.Bion''s writings, including the previously unpublished papers and additions to his Cogitations, collected together in the Complete Works, show that the clinical thrust of Bion''s work has clear lines of continuity with that of Melanie Klein, just as her work has an essential continuity with the later work of Freud. In Bion''s clinical work and supervision the goal remains insightful understanding of psychic reality through a disciplined experiencing of the transference and countertransference; the setting and the method - however much Bion''s terminology might suggest otherwise - remains rigorously psychoanalytic.