In championing a Romantic psychoanalytic attitude, Robert Snell has given us a book whose effect is like that of a pebble in a pond: whatever attitude we bring of our own, questions and ever larger questions ripple out. It will send us back to Baudelaire and the rest, invite us to bring alternative or additional texts and works of art - an invitation accepted in my own references to Swift and Pope - and in its Keatsian way teases us out of thought. It is a book to be read, reread and savoured. - Ken Robinson (Psychoanalyst, British Psychoanalytic Society), BJP, May 2014
Robert Snell is an analytic psychotherapist and his book is a timely reminder in these days of brief, economically driven therapy of the need to stay true to the basic psychoanalytic stance of respecting the client by maintaining an 'evenly suspended attention' - an undirected, actively receptive listening that involves bearing not-knowing and not foreclosing. - Gillian Ingram, Therapy Today, May 2013
This is not an easy book. It is a book of immense scholarship and refined sensibility, and may be 'above the heads' of many wouldbe readers. But for those who are up to it, this is a real treat, treating us like the sophisticated adults we hopefully are. - John Rowan, ACP North London Magazine, May 2013
The book, thoughtful, erudite and accomplished, makes a real contribution to the psychoanalytic literature. Its writer has a double professional identity. As a psychotherapist, he focuses his interest here on the particular sort of open, intense therapeutic listening which is the fundamental and difficult basis of effective clinical practice. - Melanie Hart (Analytic Psychotherapist), LCP Reflections (London Centre for Psychotherapy 'Audiences with Authors', October 27th 2012)
In championing a Romantic psychoanalytic attitude, Robert Snell has given us a book whose effect is like that of a pebble in a pond: whatever attitude we bring of our own, questions and ever larger questions ripple out. It will send us back to Baudelaire and the rest, invite us to bring alternative or additional texts and works of art - an invitation accepted in my own references to Swift and Pope - and in its Keatsian way teases us out of thought. It is a book to be read, reread and savoured.- Ken Robinson (Psychoanalyst, British Psychoanalytic Society), BJP, May 2014
Robert Snell is an analytic psychotherapist and his book is a timely reminder in these days of brief, economically driven therapy of the need to stay true to the basic psychoanalytic stance of respecting the client by maintaining an 'evenly suspended attention' - an undirected, actively receptive listening that involves bearing not-knowing and not foreclosing. - Gillian Ingram, Therapy Today, May 2013
This is not an easy book. It is a book of immense scholarship and refined sensibility, and may be 'above the heads' of many wouldbe readers. But for those who are up to it, this is a real treat, treating us like the sophisticated adults we hopefully are. - John Rowan, ACP North London Magazine, May 2013
The book, thoughtful, erudite and accomplished, makes a real contribution to the psychoanalytic literature. Its writer has a double professional identity. As a psychotherapist, he focuses his interest here on the particular sort of open, intense therapeutic listening which is the fundamental and difficult basis of effective clinical practice. - Melanie Hart (Analytic Psychotherapist), LCP Reflections (London Centre for Psychotherapy 'Audiences with Authors', October 27th 2012)
