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Psychoanalytic therapy as narrative and patients' narratives about therapy
Abstract
This dissertation contributes to redefining the relationship between literature and psychoanalytic therapy. It first presents a theoretical synthesis of contemporary literary approaches to psychoanalytic therapy as a form of narrative. It then applies this conceptual framework in close readings of four autobiographical accounts of therapy written by patients. These works, each of which exemplifies important narrative formulations of psychoanalytic therapy, are the following: Marie Cardinal's (1983) The Words to Say It, Joanne Greenberg's (1964) I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, Phillip Roth's (1974) My Life as a Man, and Irvin Yalom's and Ginny Elkin's (1974) Every Day Gets a Little Closer. The literary/clinical reading emphasizes the patient's point of view and attempts to demonstrate the usefulness of narrative metaphors in understanding the therapeutic experience and the stories patients tell in therapy and about it. Also included are an annotated bibliography of fictional and nonfiction accounts of therapy narrated from the patient's viewpoint and a review of empirical studies about discrepancies between therapists' and patients' perspectives on therapy.
Subject Area
Psychotherapy
Recommended Citation
Dauer, Steven J, "Psychoanalytic therapy as narrative and patients' narratives about therapy" (1989). Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest. AAI8917343.
https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI8917343