THE BIONIC DEVELOPMENT

This course will focus on close readings of Wilfred Bion’s theory of technique beginning with his ground-breaking and seminal paper “Notes on Memory & Desire (1967). Further elaborations from his book Attention & Interpretation (1970), and how his work was developed and extended by psychoanalysts who followed his ideas including Thomas Ogden, Antonino Ferro, Rudi Vermote, James Grotstein, Joan & Neville Symington and others. and will emphasize technique-based topics including: “Freedom from memory, desire and understanding,” “Narrative derivatives,” “O” & “K” beta, and “dreamwork alpha function,” Maternal reverie, projective identification, container & contained.