Haunted by ParentsIn this book the eminent psychoanalyst Leonard Shengold looks at why some people are resistant to change, even when it seems to promise a change for the better. Drawing on a lifetime of clinical experience as well as wide readings of world literature, Shengold shows how early childhood relationships with parents can lead to a powerful conviction that change means loss. Dr. Shengold, who is well known for his work on the lasting effects of childhood trauma and child abuse in such seminal books as Soul Murder and Soul Murder Revisited, continues his exploration into the consequences of early psychological injury and loss. In the examples of his patients and in the lives and work of such figures as Edna St. Vincent Millay, William Wordsworth, and Henrik Ibsen, Shengold looks at the different ways in which unconscious impressions connected with early experiences and fantasies about parents are integrated into individual lives. He shows the difficulties he’s encountered with his patients in raising these memories to the conscious level where they can be known and owned; and he also shows, in his survey of literary figures, how these memories can become part of the creative process. Haunted by Parents offers a deeply humane reflection on the values and limitations of therapy, on memory and the lingering effects of the past, and on the possibility of recognizing the promise of the future. |
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LibraryThing Review
User Review - dfullmer - LibraryThingA very interesting book that discussed how your relationship with your parents affects your outlook in life, and your attitude towards change. Interesting case studies of famous authors, and various patients. Read full review
Haunted by parents
User Review - Not Available - Book VerdictPsychoanalysis is much less fashionable as a treatment modality than it once was. However, this book, which is grounded in that tradition, revisits some of its key concepts in a thoughtful ... Read full review
Contents
A Literary Example of Haunting Dr Benjamin Spock | 1 |
A Clinical Illustration of Some of My Main Themes | 20 |
Knowing Change and Good and Bad Expectations | 28 |
Beginnings and Wordsworths Immortality Ode | 38 |
Change Means Loss Spring and Summer Must Become Winter | 50 |
The Myth of Demeter and Persephone | 65 |
Another Dream of Death in a Garden | 71 |
A Clinical and a Literary Example Edna St Vincent Millay | 77 |
On Listening Knowing and Owning | 177 |
Gardens Unweeded Gardens and the Garden of Eden Death and Transience | 191 |
THE PROMISE and Ibsens A Dolls House and Hedda Gabler | 197 |
What Do I Know? | 221 |
Postscript | 232 |
Hartmann on the Genetic Point of View and Object Constancy | 235 |
References | 243 |
| 247 | |
A Second Literary Example Leonard Woolf | 101 |
A Third Literary Example Sergei Timofeevich Aksakov | 131 |
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Common terms and phrases
able achieved adult Aksakov analyst appears became become began beginning called child childhood comes consciously continued course danger death describes died dream early Edna emotional emphasis added especially evoked example existence expectations expressed father feel felt followed Freud garden give happy haunted human husband intense interest involves kind later leave Leonard letters lived looked loss marriage means memory Millay mind mother murder never Nora object once parents past patient perhaps person play poem positive present promise psychic psychological published quoted rage relation relationship remains remember resistance seems sense separation Sergei sexual shows sister sometimes Spock spring started subsequent tell thought tion told Torvald Trekkie trying turned unconscious usually wanted wife wish Woolf writes wrote young
Bibliographic information
| Title | Haunted by Parents |
| Author | Leonard Shengold |
| Edition | unabridged |
| Publisher | Yale University Press, 2006 |
| ISBN | 0300116101, 9780300116106 |
| Length | 257 pages |
| Subjects | › Psychology / Reference |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |