A Conversation between Lewis “Lew” Aron (1952–2019) and Steven Kuchuck

ABSTRACT

What follows is an edited transcription of a filmed interview that was originally commissioned by the International Association for Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy (IARPP) for their Relational Voices Project. The video is available for viewing by IARPP members. The interview appears here by permission of IARPP. My memory for the details of how we invited Lew is foggy, and quite frankly, I didn’t have the heart to go back through my e-mails with him in order to refresh my memory. I do know that I was President-elect of IARPP at the time the idea was conceived by us on the Board’s Executive Committee. Past (and now once again, current) President Susi Nebbiosi had started this video archive sometime before the decision to ask Lew. Both to my chagrin and delight, Lew asked if I would be the one to interview him. Like many, I suppose, I don’t like watching myself on video and while I’m very happy behind a podium, the same isn’t always true in front of a camera. I think that has probably changed to some degree since Covid forced us to get used to being on Zoom and often having our teaching and lectures filmed. But back then, I was anxious about the idea and postponed hiring the camera man and setting the date. Lew didn’t seem to be in a rush either. Eventually, we confessed to each other that we had both been avoiding this, each hoping to lose some weight before filming. Alas, the clock was ticking, and the winter holidays with their temptations were upon us. We finally sat down together one week after Lew’s 65th birthday, in December 2017.

KEYWORDS:

• Relational
• dramatic dialogs
• Mitchell
• intersubjective
• mutuality

Postscript

Lew’s illness took a severe turn for the worse about 9 months after this interview was conducted. He left us five months after that, just over a year after our conversation, on February 28th, 2019. As per his wishes, Lew’s partner, Galit Atlas, edited the collection of papers Lew tells us about in the interview. When Minds Meet: The Work of Lewis Aron, was published posthumously, in 2020.¹

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

¹Drawn from Wikipedia page devoted to Lew Aron. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_Aron.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lew Aron

Lewis Aron (December 21, 1952 – February 28, 2019) was the Director of the New York University Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis in New York City. He was the founding president of the International Association for Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy and was formerly President of the Division of Psychoanalysis of the American Psychological Association. He was board certified in psychoanalysis by the American Board of Professional Psychology (ABPP) and a Fellow of the American Board of Psychoanalysis (FABP). He wrote the books A Meeting of Minds: Mutuality in Psychoanalysis and edited the volume with Stephen Mitchell, Relational Psychoanalysis: The Emergence of a Tradition. Together with Adrienne Harris, he edited the Relational Perspectives Book Series, which has published many of the texts in the field. Aron was one of the founders of the journal Psychoanalytic Dialogues: The International Journal of Relational Perspectives.¹

Steven Kuchuck

Steven Kuchuck, DSW, is Senior Consulting Editor (formerly Editor-in-Chief) of Psychoanalytic Perspectives; Co-Editor, Routledge Relational Perspectives Book Series; Immediate Past President of the International Association for Relational Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy (IARPP); faculty, NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis, NIP National Training Program, Stephen Mitchell Relational Study Center, and other institutes. His most recent books are The Relational Revolution in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy (Confer, 2021) and The Work Books of Masud Khan: Diary of a Fallen Psychoanalyst (Karnac, in press, co-edited with Linda Hopkins). In 2015 and 2016, he won the Gradiva Award for best psychoanalytic book: Clinical Implications of the Psychoanalyst’s Life Experience: When the Personal Becomes Professional and The Legacy of Sandor Ferenczi: From Ghost to Ancestor (co-edited with Adrienne Harris). His clinical and supervisory practice is in Manhattan, and his study groups, online.