{"title":"Books by Christopher Bollas","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9780197683880","title":"Essential Aloneness","description":"Essential Aloneness presents a series of lectures on DW Winnicott delivered by Christopher Bollas in the 1980s to students and staff of the Institute of Child Neuropsychiatry at the University of Rome. Those attending were familiar with Winnicott's works; indeed, many were expert. But a question remained. How do you use Winnicott's concepts in the clinical space? Bollas not only addresses that question but also writes about his own clinical formulations at the time, such as 'the transformational object' or 'the unthought known.'Each chapter contains a unique and distinct talk, as delivered and suffused with the aliveness that is a hallmark of in-person lectures, with Bollas exhibiting a remarkable flexibility of scope and focus in order to meet the attendant group's clinical interests. The book teems with questions of Winnicottian psychoanalytic theory and practice no less relevant today than when the lectures were first delivered. These questions identify the subtle and complex positions taken by Winnicott, as understood by Bollas and other analysts in the United Kingdom and in Italy, who worked with him and knew how to make use of the Winnicott object.One of Winnicott's literary editors, Bollas brings a unique perspective in real time to the challenges Winnicott's thinking posed to the psychoanalytical, literary, and intellectual culture in the United Kingdom and abroad in the decade after Winnicott's death.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56226307211637,"sku":"9780197683880","price":25.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780197683880_e5f86588-20d9-4e24-9ac6-becfaa475d3e.jpg?v=1786011034"},{"product_id":"9780415220330","title":"Hysteria","description":"Bollas offers an original and illuminating theory of hysteria that weaves its well-known features - repressed sexual ideas; indifference to conversions; over-identification with the other - into the hysteric form.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56288393036149,"sku":"9780415220330","price":33.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780415220330_3c037d40-b17d-423b-a7bd-b6654208c992.jpg?v=1786013570"},{"product_id":"9780415088152","title":"Being a Character","description":"Taking Freud's model of dreamwork as a model for all unconscious thinking, Bollas argues that we dreamwork ourselves into becoming who we are. He illustrates how patient and analyst can use such unconscious processes to alter self experience.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56289752744309,"sku":"9780415088152","price":37.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780415088152_a6723737-a151-4089-be72-245b9482998d.jpg?v=1786013494"},{"product_id":"9781800132474","title":"Conversations","description":"Christopher Bollas presents us with a new literary form in his Conversations: twenty-three unique dialogues to captivate, amuse, and inspire.   The psychoanalyst Paula Heimann asked: ‘Who is speaking? To whom? About what? And why now?’ We speak with the voice and position of many others – mothers, fathers, siblings, teachers – and ordinary conversation therefore stages the history of our interpersonal engagements. Heimann’s questions also apply when we talk to ourselves, and our inner dialogues reveal the hidden genius of our private world in which we are both actor and audience, poet and reader, politician and electorate. It's quite a ride, and an art form all of its own.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56306835063157,"sku":"9781800132474","price":19.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781800132474_bd9986a7-fa67-4043-8760-2362bf31d43f.jpg?v=1786027349"},{"product_id":"9781800132580","title":"Streams of Consciousness","description":"In Christopher Bollas' Streams of Consciousness, a wide spectrum of theory and practice are explored, sometimes appearing in simple fragments, sometimes via complex lines of thinking that are developed in detail over time. As Bollas revisits the received truths and dogmas of his profession - including his own prejudices - he demonstrates the value of open, intelligent uncertainty. Interspersed with clinical preoccupations, which highlight the richness as well as the bewildering complexity of psychoanalysis, we find other ideas that reflect his early life as political activist, literature professor, and cultural critic. Throughout, the notebooks are enriched by references to the work of numerous writers in many fields who have influenced his thinking.  This work is essential reading for all with an interest in psychoanalysis which will enrich both academic study and clinical practice.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56306943721845,"sku":"9781800132580","price":39.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781800132580_04d16134-f2f2-4733-976f-52d71accae17.jpg?v=1786027351"},{"product_id":"9781800132610","title":"Streams of Consciousness","description":"In Christopher Bollas' Streams of Consciousness, a wide spectrum of theory and practice are explored, sometimes appearing in simple fragments, sometimes via complex lines of thinking that are developed in detail over time. As Bollas revisits the received truths and dogmas of his profession - including his own prejudices - he demonstrates the value of open, intelligent uncertainty. Interspersed with clinical preoccupations, which highlight the richness as well as the bewildering complexity of psychoanalysis, we find other ideas that reflect his early life as political activist, literature professor, and cultural critic. Throughout, the notebooks are enriched by references to the work of numerous writers in many fields who have influenced his thinking.  This work is essential reading for all with an interest in psychoanalysis which will enrich both academic study and clinical practice.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56307217891701,"sku":"9781800132610","price":39.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781800132610_ac485122-8942-45cf-a920-6ee4665f9691.jpg?v=1786027352"},{"product_id":"9781912691814","title":"Three Characters","description":"It is important to point out that these essays are about character types; it is not to suggest that all borderlines, narcissists or manic depressives are the same. Everyone is an individual and are who they are for many different reasons. What they have in common is a typical relation between their subjectivity and the world they inhabit. In other words, Christopher Bollas has identified the axioms that these individuals share. Following a discussion of the features of each type, the axioms are delivered in the character’s own voice. By placing ourselves within their own logic, we can begin to identify and empathise with them. At the root of all character disorders there is mental pain and each disorder is an intelligent attempt to solve an existential problem. If the clinician can grasp their specific intelligence and help the analysand to understand this, then a natural process of healing can begin.   Three Characters is a masterclass based on decades of lectures presented to psychoanalysts, analytical psychologists, and psychotherapists, and is a must-read for all psychoanalytic enthusiasts.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309037859189,"sku":"9781912691814","price":19.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781912691814_7576d42b-578d-4fec-a382-1b1e3e53ec56.jpg?v=1786030184"},{"product_id":"9780300223651","title":"When the Sun Bursts – The Enigma of Schizophrenia","description":"A leading psychoanalyst shares his experiences working with schizophrenic patients to show how effective talk therapy can be as a treatment   Many schizophrenics experience their condition as one of radical incarceration, mind-altering medications, isolation, and dehumanization.  At a time when the treatment of choice is anti-psychotic medication, world-renowned psychoanalyst Christopher Bollas asserts that schizophrenics can be helped by much more humane treatments, and that they have a chance to survive and even reverse the process if they have someone to talk to them regularly and for a sustained period, soon after their first breakdown.    In this sensitive and evocative narrative, he draws on his personal experiences working with schizophrenics since the 1960’s. He offers his interpretation of how schizophrenia develops, typically in the teens, as an adaptation in the difficult transition to adulthood.  With tenderness, Bollas depicts schizophrenia as an understandable way of responding to our precariousness in a highly unpredictable world.  He celebrates the courage of the children he has worked with and reminds us that the wisdom inherent in human beings—to turn to conversation with others when in distress—is the fundamental foundation of any cure for human conflict.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56311678796149,"sku":"9780300223651","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780300223651_1fabb598-869c-4124-a32f-2712374abef1.jpg?v=1786012152"},{"product_id":"9798216202035","title":"Pitching to the Dream Team","description":"The book offers a radical, refreshing, innovative, provocative, and generative perspective on conflict solution whether in an organization or government. It also offers an entirely new set of terms and concepts to access, utilize, and share unconscious creativity.  Almost all the top-down organizational assumptions in government and business stifle creativity rather than facilitate it.  The book offers a multitude of practical improvements that will alter our understanding of vision and creativity.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56369549771125,"sku":"9798216202035","price":70.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9798216202035_320c6b9e-ff55-45c1-a41d-8635814df32e.jpg?v=1793377292"},{"product_id":"the-infinite-question","title":"The Infinite Question","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn his latest book Christopher Bollas uses detailed studies of real clinical practice to illuminate a theory of psychoanalysis which privileges the human impulse to question. From earliest childhood to the end of our lives, we are driven by this impulse in its varying forms, and \u003cem\u003eThe Infinite Question\u003c\/em\u003e illustrates how Freud's free associative method provides both patient and analyst with answers and, in turn, with an ongoing interplay of further questions.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAt the book's core are transcripts of real analytical sessions, accompanied by parallel commentaries which highlight key aspects of the free associative method in practice. These transcripts are contextualised by further discussion of the cases themselves, as well as a wider theoretical framework which places its emphasis on Freud's theory of the logic of sequence: by learning to listen to this free associative logic, Bollas argues, we can discover a richer and more complex unconscious voice than if we rely solely on Freud's theory of repressed ideas.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBollas demonstrates, in an eloquent and persuasive manner, how the Freudian position of evenly suspended attentiveness enables the analyst's unconscious to catch the drift of the patient's own unconscious. He also shows that to stimulate further questioning is often of more benefit to the analytical process than to jump to an interpretation. Yet whatever fascinating course a session may take, neither the patient nor the analyst can halt the progress of the self-propelling interrogative drive.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Infinite Question\u003c\/em\u003e will be invaluable to both the new student and the experienced psychoanalyst, read either on its own or as a practice-based extension of the theoretical ideas elaborated in its companion volume, \u003cem\u003eThe Evocative Object World\u003c\/em\u003e (also published by Routledge).\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57466594328949,"sku":"9780415473927","price":25.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780415473927.jpg?v=1785654652"},{"product_id":"meaning-and-melancholia","title":"Meaning and Melancholia","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eMeaning and Melancholia: Life in the Age of Bewilderment\u003c\/em\u003e sees Christopher Bollas apply his creative and innovative psychoanalytic thinking to various contemporary social, cultural and political themes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis book offers an incisive exploration of powerful trends within, and between, nations in the West over the past two hundred years. The author traces shifts in psychological forces and 'frames of mind', that have resulted in a crucial 'intellectual climate change'. He contends that recent decades have seen rapid and significant transformations in how we define our 'selves', as a new emphasis on instant connectedness has come to replace reflectiveness and introspection.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBollas argues that this trend has culminated in the current rise of psychophobia; a fear of the mind and a rejection of depth psychologies that has paved the way for what he sees as hate based solutions to world problems, such as the victory of Trump in America and Brexit in the United Kingdom. He maintains that, if we are to counter the threat to democracy posed by these changes and refind a more balanced concept of the self within society, we must put psychological insight at the heart of a new kind of analysis of culture and society.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis remarkable, thought-provoking book will appeal to anyone interested in politics, social policy and cultural studies, and in the gaining of insight into the ongoing challenges faced by the Western democracies and the global community.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57483472535925,"sku":"9781138497535","price":41.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781138497535.jpg?v=1786178639"},{"product_id":"axioms-of-mind-and-lived-experience","title":"Axioms of Mind and Lived Experience","description":"We humans contain multitudes. We do not have an internal world; we have many internal worlds. Time, circumstance, and the maturational processes will alter those worlds as we move through the life cycle. When we come for psychoanalysis, we will inevitably enact axioms from the many differing worlds inhabited by the self.   The assumed identifies three interrelated unconscious phenomena. First, the self's erroneous assumption that consciousness comprehends the stream of unconscious contents passing through it in the here and now. Second, mental \"constellations”, forms of memory that collect into a dense inner object, so that when the self thinks about one aspect of the constellation, the entirety feels as if it is there. Third, those forms of knowledge derived entirely from the \"unthought known\": the knowledge that arrives out of actions and interactions.   This cluster of unconscious assumptions are crucial to human thinking and behavior. Therefore, identifying this realm offers useful perspectives on the self and on clinical practice to enable analytical work in these areas. When the assumed is weakened or breaks down, we are witness to psychotic processes, and the restoration of mental well-being is a crucial priority and must precede the search for meanings.   Mental Axioms and Lived Experience: On Character and the Assumed opens vital new perspectives to expand psychoanalytic thinking and understanding of the individual, society, and human nature. This makes it essential reading for practising clinicians, trainees, academics, and those of us interested in the complexities of the human mind.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57524686979445,"sku":"9781800134799","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781800134799.jpg?v=1791840024"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-christopher-bollas.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}