ABSTRACT
This chapter is a tribute to Willi Hoffer presenting child psychiatry case description passing on from that to an appreciation of Hoffer's work. The mother often felt, she said, that she could manage breast feeding the boy if it were not for the sister's very special attitude. The sister is intensely interested, but is unable to stand the baby brother's crying. In the example that follows, taken from the same article, Hoffer pleasantly describes what he observes: Bertie, a boy of 16 weeks, is an experienced finger-sucker who suspends his ring finger in his mouth by bending the three remaining fingers and pressing them like a scaffolding towards the lower lip, thus preventing the hand from sliding into the mouth. Hoffer examines this subject again by making use of the detailed observations he had been making in the Hampstead Nursery. The chapter speaks about exploitation of satisfaction in defence against anxiety, the beginnings of control omnipotence.
