ABSTRACT
The author emphasizes the clinical, therapeutic purpose of psychoanalysis and, hence, the difficulty of theorizing about technique. He retraces the origins of psychoanalysis in the German language, illustrated by the differences between the terms Deutung, as part of the analyst's ongoing subjective mental activity, and interpretation which has acquired the guise of objectivity.
The chapter explores the difficulties involved in interpretation, in choosing what, when, and how to interpret. He comments in detail on Winnicott's idea of prioritizing the “natural evolution of the transference” before attempting an interpretation, and notes Winnicott's reminder that the patient has the answers. Whether interpreting or choosing not to interpret, the analyst is mirroring what the patient has communicated. Clinical examples show how interpretation can be mishandled because analysis is a relationship and therefore the analyst's intervention can be an imposition or a constraint. By its nature, an interpretation separates the participants in analysis and creates an object to talk about.
The author questions an overemphasis on self-disclosure and intersubjectivity, which he sees as especially prevalent in the USA. This approach prioritizes the here-and-now over the retrospect of Nachträglichkeit, and pays too little respect to the patient's history. The theory of intersubjectivity risks reification, whereas the author prefers to emphasize a dialectical interplay.
Intersubjective communication is distinguished from self-disclosure because in the former unconscious is speaking to unconscious. The resulting paradox is how can an intrapsychic model (the dream) function in the service of an intersubjective experience? Intrapsychic and intersubjective need to be seen as two ways of considering the same question. A boundary needs to be maintained between the countertransference and the analyst's privacy/individuality.
