ABSTRACT
This chapter investigates hitherto unexplored connections between Donald Winnicott and Phyllis Greenacre. A report by David Milrod admirably conveys how the evening's participants understood Winnicott's paper. The central thesis of Dr Winnicott's paper is the proposition that the use of an object constitutes a more advanced and sophisticated stage of development than does relating to an object. Greenacre's point of departure is her discussion of Willi Hoffer's papers on the role of touch and vision in distinguishing self from non-self, with her noting that touch, skin contact, is also a potent conveyer of oneness with the mother, with her warm body. In June of 1968, Masud Khan invited Greenacre to write a paper for a volume he and Winnicott were planning on transitional phenomena. Apparently Winnicott envisioned revising and enlarging his original 1951 paper on the transitional object as well as including other papers he had written related to the topic.
