ISFN Book Presentation Series – Event Archive
In support of
Previous 2023-2024 Events
October 7, 2023
Author: Carlo Bonomi
A Brief Apocalyptic History of Psychoanalysis: Erasing Trauma
Moderator: Giselle Galdi
Discussant: Endre Koritar and Fergal Brady
The story told in this book centers on the genital mutilation endured in her childhood by Emma Eckstein, Freud’s most important patient in his abandonment of the “seduction theory.” For both cultural and personal reasons, Freud could not recognize the traumatic nature of this “Beschneidung” (circumcision), which nevertheless aroused in him deep anguish, conflating his own circumcision, the echoes of a violently anti-Semitic environment, and conflicts with his father. Taking Freud’s countertransference to Eckstein’s trauma into account leads to a radically different understanding of the origins of psychoanalysis from the one based on the solipsistic perspective of his self-analysis.
Carlo Bonomi Ph.D., works and lives in Florence, Italy. He is training and supervising analyst of the Società Italiana di Psicoanalisi e Psicoterapia Sándor Ferenczi and president of the International Sándor Ferenczi Network (ISFN), co-editor-in-chief of the Italian journal The Wise Baby/Il poppante saggio, associate editor of the International Forum of Psychoanalysis, and international editor or adviser of many other psychoanalytic journals. He has taught History of Psychology and Dynamic Psychology at the University of Florence and has authored about 100 articles and several books, among which The Cut and the Building of Psychoanalysis, in two volumes (Routledge, 2015, 2018). His last book A Brief Apocalyptic History of Psychoanalysis (Routledge, 2022) will appear in French under the title Le traumatisme en heritage. Aux origines de la psychanalyse (Edition Amsterdam, 2023).
Endre Koritar, M.D., FRCP(C), FIPA, is a training and supervising analyst with the Western Canada Psychoanalytic Society Institute. He is an Assistant Clinical Professor of the University of British Columbia affiliated with the Department of Psychiatry. He is on the Board of Directors of the ISFN, the National Council of the Canadian Psychoanalytic Society, the National Training Committee, and an Associate Editor of the American Journal of Psychoanalysis. He is interested in researching and elaborating on the ideas of Sándor Ferenczi, who was a harbinger of contemporary psychoanalytic theory and technique.
Fergal Brady is a psycho-analytical psychotherapist and supervisor working in private practice in Dundalk, Ireland. He has spoken at conferences in Ireland and internationally about trauma, sexual trauma, Ferenczi and the Budapest School. His paper An extract of the analysis of the Monkey Puzzle Boy was published in the International Forum of Psychoanalysis in 2019. It was later translated into Italian and published in the Wise Baby journal in 2020 under the title Il monkey Puzzle Boy: Stretto di una analisi. In 2019 he organised the conference The Budapest School of Psychoanalysis in Dublin. Last year he gave a series of lectures in Trinity College Dublin called the Budapest School of Psychoanalysis. He is a grandfather and the President of the Irish Psycho-Analytical Association.
Giselle Galdi, Ph.D., is a psychologist, psychoanalyst and Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Psychoanalysis, which is publishing its 83rd volume in 2023. She is a training and supervising analyst, former director of the Trauma Center at the Karen Horney Clinic, in NYC. She is a member of APsaA, IPA, AAP, AIP, the Sándor Ferenczi Center in NYC and a Board member of the ISFN. She is also in private practice in NYC.
December 2, 2023
Author: Kathleen Kelley-Lainé
Peter Pan, the Lost Child
Moderator: John Tavares
Discussant: Endre Koritar and Maia Kirchkheli
Peter Pan, “young innocent and heartless”, with his baby tooth smile is one of the most popular heroes of fiction of both children and adults for over one hundred years. The author explores this mythical figure, both as a story as well as a metaphor, revealing the hidden traumas and psychological conundrums of this “Lost Child”. The evocative and lyrical style takes the reader through multiple levels of understanding of this seemingly simple “fairy tale”, into the tragic story of its author J. M. Barrie and of other Peter Pans who never grow up.
Kathleen Kelley-Lainé, is a trilingual psychoanalyst working in private practice (English, French and Hungarian). She is an active member of the Société Psychanalytique de Paris, the European Psychoanalytical Federation, the International Psychoanalytical Association, and the International Sándor Ferenczi Society. She is internationally known for her many conferences, published articles in psychoanalytical journals, and books.
Endre Koritar, M.D., FRCP(C), FIPA, is a training and supervising analyst with the Western Canada Psychoanalytic Society Institute. He is an Assistant Clinical Professor of the University of British Columbia affiliated with the Department of Psychiatry. He is on the Board of Directors of the ISFN, the National Council of the Canadian Psychoanalytic Society, the National Training Committee, and an Associate Editor of the American Journal of Psychoanalysis. He is interested in researching and elaborating on the ideas of Sándor Ferenczi, who was a harbinger of contemporary psychoanalytic theory and technique.
Maia Kirchkheli is a fellow of the British Psychoanalytical Society and a member of the International Psycho-analytical Association. Initially trained as a psychiatrist she worked in a drug and substance misuse center in Georgia. Maia is currently in full-time private practice in London. She teaches the psychoanalytic theory at The Institute of Psychoanalysis, British Psychoanalytic Association, and University College London. Her essay ‘Beyond words’ won the Winnicott Essay Prize (Student Path) marking the publication of the Collected Works of D.W. Winnicott by Oxford University Press in 2017. Rozsika Parker Prize (post qualification path) for Holding and Visceral Attention, published by the Journal of British Psychotherapy, 2021.
John Tavares, is a psychoanalyst and psychiatrist affiliated with the Western Canadian Psychoanalytic Society and Institue. He currently works in private practice and shared psychiatric care in Vancouver, British Columbia. He obtained his medical doctorate from the University of Ottawa and completed a psychiatric residency at the University of British Columbia (UBC). After residency, he worked at a local hospital providing general adult psychiatric treatment to a diverse population of patients in outpatient, crisis assessment, and emergency room settings. More recently, focus of his work has been provision of psychodynamic therapy as well as didactic teaching and clinical supervision in his role as Clinical Assistant Professor at UBC. He is a current member of the editorial board of the American Journal of Psychoanalysis.
February 3, 2024
Author: Anna Borgos
Women in the Budapest School of Psychoanalysis: Girls of Tomorrow
Moderator: Judit Székács-Weisz
Discussant: Endre Koritar and Raluca Soreanu
This book shines a light on the social and professional factors on the life and work of the first women psychoanalysts in Budapest, examining documentary evidence of their lives and drawing upon the literature of psychoanalysis, social history, and gender studies. Through their life stories, not only the history of psychoanalysis, but also the processes of 20th-century women’s history and social-political developments in Hungary and the region can be reconstructed. Key psychoanalysts explored include Lilly Hajdu, Edit Gyömrői, Alice Bálint, Vilma Kovács, Lillián Rotter and twelve further women analysts.
Anna Borgos (PhD) is a psychologist and women’s historian, working as a research fellow in the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology (Budapest) and as the editor in chief of the Hungarian psychoanalytic journal Imágó Budapest. Her main research interests are the career of intellectual women in the early 20th century and the history of sexuality. Her latest book, Women in the Budapest School of Psychoanalysis: Girls of Tomorrow was published at Routledge in 2021. With Ferenc Erős and Júlia Gyimesi she co-edited the volume Psychology and Politics: Intersections of Science and Ideology in the History of Psy-Sciences (CEU Press, 2019).
Endre Koritar, M.D., FRCP(C), FIPA, is a training and supervising analyst with the Western Canada Psychoanalytic Society Institute. He is an Assistant Clinical Professor of the University of British Columbia affiliated with the Department of Psychiatry. He is on the Board of Directors of the ISFN, the National Council of the Canadian Psychoanalytic Society, the National Training Committee, and an Associate Editor of the American Journal of Psychoanalysis. He is interested in researching and elaborating on the ideas of Sándor Ferenczi, who was a harbinger of contemporary psychoanalytic theory and technique.
Raluca Soreanu is Professor of Psychoanalytic Studies at the Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex, and psychoanalyst, member of the Círculo Psicanalítico do Rio de Janeiro. She is co-author, with Jakob Staberg and Jenny Willner, of Ferenczi Dialogues: On Trauma and Catastrophe (Leuven University Press, 2023). Between 2022 and 2027, she is leading the interdisciplinary research project FREEPSY: Free Clinics and a Psychoanalysis for the People: Progressive Histories, Collective Practices, Implications for Our Times (UKRI Frontier Research Grant). She is Academic Associate of the Freud Museum London, where she has taught courses on the work of Ferenczi.
Judit Szekacs-Weisz is a bilingual psychoanalyst and psychotherapist, a member of the British and the Hungarian Psychoanalytical Society. Born and educated (mostly) in Budapest, she has absorbed the ideas and way of thinking of Ferenczi, the Balints, Hermann, and Rajka as integral parts of a “professional mother tongue”. She is author of several articles, and co-editor of Lost Childhood and the Language of Exile. Together with Tom Keve she co-edited Ferenczi and His World and Ferenczi for Our Time.
(€ 30, 50, 100 or 150)