ABSTRACT
The chapter is structured as a scripted dialogue between a psychoanalyst and a martial arts practitioner. It asserts that both martial arts and psychoanalysis are regarded with suspicion in British culture. Is the martial arts student a closet paranoid bully? Does one have to be mad to be in analysis? What is it that people look for in either practice? Does it have to do, in part, with an unconscious quest—and, if so, what is this quest? The chapter explores the relationship to the notion of the master and the analyst in perceived parallels between martial arts, psychoanalytic psychotherapy, and the arts.
