ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the evidence on use of imagination and metaphor in autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) and illustrates these themes using the case of The Silky Stranger. It investigates the potential for metaphor in dramatherapy to work therapeutically with, and develops the imaginative resources of, young people with ASD. F. G. E. Happe illustrated difficulties in imagination and metaphor in ASD in terms of deficits in Theory of Mind. The chapter presents a case study that demonstrates how the core processes and action-based methods enable personal psychological material to be processed, and a challenging scenario managed, by an individual with ASD. The Silky Stranger was a character created in dramatherapy by an 11-year-old boy Adam with ASD who was approaching a challenging transition from primary to secondary school. In the dramatherapy, Adam was offered a number of different media: visual images, projective work with fabric and small objects, movement and game structures, original storytelling and enactment.
