The Psychoanalysis Between Sándor Ferenczi and Elizabeth Severn: Mutuality, Unconscious Communication, and the Development of Countertransference Analysis

ABSTRACT

The psychoanalysis between Sándor Ferenczi and Elizabeth Severn was characterized by a controversial counterference analysis, in which the analysand, Severn, took an active lead. She can be seen as the co-creator of the Countertransference Analysis. In the two-person analytic dialogue that Severn and Ferenczi created to resolve the intractable therapeutic impasse in their analytic relationship, a dialogue of the unconscious emerged. Severn believed she was attuned to Ferenczi’s unanalyzed countertransference reaction to her. They had a special kind of relationship where attunement was at an unconscious level. In a sustained analytic encounter, she helped Ferenczi retrieve the experience of being sexually abused, which was the unconscious derivation of his negative countertransference to Severn.

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Arnold Wm. Rachman

Arnold Wm. Rachman, Ph.D., FAGPA, is a Member, Board of Directors, Sándor Ferenczi Center, The New School for Social Research, New York City; an Honorary Member of The Sándor Ferenczi Society, Budapest, Hungary; and Donor of The Elizabeth Severn Papers, The Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. and the Ferenczi House, Budapest, Hungary.