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The Logics of Madness: On Infantile and Delusional Transference

Author(s) : Salomon Resnik

Reviews and Endorsements

‘Whereas thought disorder is simply a symptom that psychiatrists look for, there is a long tradition within psychoanalysis of unpacking psychotic symptoms in order to give them sensible meanings – that is, sensible for the patient in their petrified world. This tradition for making the irrational into rational expression started with Freud and Jung – and it is a tradition that is alive and well in Salomon Resnik’s work. The ability to make sense of delusions takes long experience, but the capacity to convey that sense convincingly and clearly to a reader requires even more experience and talent. This is what the present book does – it treats the utterances of psychotic patients as a literary text, to be unravelled for all its pregnant associations. Delusions become subtle illusions. This capacity to translate insanity into an emotional sanity is at its peak here, and there is a kind of awe in following Resnik’s virtuosity. More than this we need to learn his art of translation, of visiting each patient’s own world as a foreign land. Not only should psychoanalysts interest themselves in this art; but psychoanalysts have some responsibility for getting psychiatrists interested too.’
- R.D. Hinshelwood, Professor, Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex