A transference from somewhere else: Reevalution of the controversies between Melanie Klein and Anna Freud

Starting from The Freud-Klein Controversies, the author explores the historical reality of these controversies and their transformations into myth which give them the appearance of titanic fights. The verification of the different periods, the description of the variations in themes and style of intervention of the principal actors of these debates show aspects of the way a psychoanalytic insitute works and of the theoretical elaboration in psychoanalysis : these appear very different from what the myth suggests. The major function of myth is, as Freud noted and Strachey reminds us, to hide very trite, even shameful realities. History and myth, theoritical effort and institutional li,fe are all organized from and around transference, a major axis of psychoanalytic thought. When we organize our psychoanalytic lives in societies, we have the pride or the vanity of participating in a great historical movement. This goes back to the work of tranference in institutionnal life that involves primal objects in the crudeness of their sexuality. Such is the constraining strength of transference. Being fully conscious of it, like Stratchey or Balint show us, enables to alleviate its violence and stimulate creativity.