Psychoanalysis: Listening to Understand contains so much wisdom and demonstrates a way of thinking that allows for growth, expansion of mind, and deep contact with psychic life. Having these articles together in one volume makes each of the ideas more vibrant as it intersects with others. Together they make the songs of inner life into an unforgettable chorus. Arlene Kramer Richards is always listening for pain, affect, experience, and unconscious fantasies and imagery with the courage it takes to believe there is more to learn.

Any struggle with trying to define what psychoanalysis is could be resolved by traveling with Arlene as she thinks, explores the psyche, practices in her consulting room, teaches, supervises, and writes. The papers in this volume contain breakthrough ideas in areas of female development, perverseness of mind, creativity and poetry, and the experience of extreme loneliness. She draws us into the world of film and the layers of unconscious depicted in the dramas. She brings insight to areas of study with an eye to what others have been afraid to see. One comes away from the pages of this book knowing a lot more than they had imagined. And, even more impressively, readers will realize they now feel more able to delve further and continue learning as Arlene’s voice demonstrates.