Psychoanalytic Understanding of Violence and Suicide

This pioneering volume presents the intensive psychoanalytic treatment of patients who have committed serious acts of violence either against others or themselves. Although there is a vast literature on aggression, comparatively little has been written on the issue of violence and even fewer clinical discussions have been published on the violent patient. In the process of reading each individual chapter, identifying the richness and complexity of each individual analysis and each analyst's imaginative understanding of their patients, crucial themes underpinning the analysis of the violence patient are made accessible to the reader. Moreover, in each of the detailed clinical accounts there is a demonstration of the effectiveness of the psychoanalytic treatment.