Freud and Beyond

“Absolutely crucial in reformulating the psychoanalytic project to meet the intellectual and emotional demands upon it a century after its birth.”—Guardian

"Whenever I have been asked to recommend a fundamental text for graduate students and young professionals, or even for those expressing an initial interest in psychotherapy, Stephen A. Mitchell and Margaret J. Black's Freud and Beyond has been my go to text. The new edition, including an excellent preface highlighting recent developments in the field, remains the best survey of the history and development of psychoanalysis and the essential guide to its many schools, approaches and innovations. Brilliantly explaining theory and elucidating clinical practice with elegant and compelling case illustrations, this comprehensive introduction remains the best place to start in understanding Freud and his legacy."—Lewis Aron, Ph.D., former director, New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy & Psychoanalysis

"Psychoanalysis is only valuable as uncommon common sense. Freud and Beyond is such an impressive and useful book because it makes psychoanalysis even more interesting by making it accessible."—Adam Phillips, author of Missing Out

"The best single treatment of psychoanalytic theories, classical and current."—Choice

"A fascinating, lucid, and surprisingly comprehensive overview of the development of psychoanalytic theory and practice since Freud."—Readings

"[Freud and Beyond] is remarkably coherent in a field notorious for the density of its technical prose. Authors such as Otto Kernberg and Jacques Lacan... are presented with great clarity."—Boston Book Review

"This is a marvelous book which gives an overview of the work of just about all Freud's important disciples and dissenters. It is well recommended."—Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Review

"Mitchell and Black offer a compelling vision of a profession 'struggling to expand and redefine itself.'"—Boston Phoenix Literary Section

"The advantage of this book lies in its relative simplicity. Writing for the reader with little psychoanalytic training, the authors share the myths, developments, and inadequacies in psychoanalytic thought over time."—Clinical Social Work Journal

"Inclusive, integrated, and lively, this book sets a new high standard as an introduction to contemporary psychoanalysis."—Library Journal

"An excellent starting place for anyone unfamiliar with the radical shift psychoanalytic thinking has undergone since Freud."—Kirkus

"Written with great vitality, clarity, and charm, this work of master teachers represents a Declaration of Independence for students of psychoanalysis in their persistent rethinking of its meanings and methods."—Leston Havens, MD, professor of psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, and author of Coming to Life

"An excellent work...Provides a clear, thorough introduction to several theories about the mysterious workings of the mind."—Booklist