The Language of Psycho-Analysis

A dictionary of the concepts of psychoanalysis by Jean Laplanche and Jean-Bertrand Pontalis, prepared over eight years at Daniel Lagache's instigation and published by the Presses universitaires de France in 1967, in Lagache's Bibliothèque de psychanalyse. Donald Nicholson-Smith's English translation, The Language of Psycho-Analysis, appeared from the Hogarth Press in 1973. Freud kept revising his theory and never fixed it in a final system, so instead of bare definitions each entry traces how a concept arose and changed in his writings, supports the account with the relevant passages, and sets out its difficulties. The alphabetical entries run from abreaction to working-through and also take in terms of later analysts, such as the mirror stage and the transitional object. Some entries brought neglected Freudian notions back into use, notably après-coup (afterwardsness) and Anlehnung, rendered as étayage (leaning-on). The book has been translated into more than twenty languages and become a standard reference.