Review of Evening Sessions with Dr. Priestly by Cathy Lobel (2007) Two Lights Press. Reviewed by Arlene Kramer Richards
www.EveningSessions.com Cathylobel@rcn.com

This small self published “testament to psychoanalysis” presents a narrative of the development of one woman’s psychoanalytic understanding of herself interlarded with a series of selections from religious texts on themes similar to those in the analytic narrative. Presenting biblical quotes on the left hand pages and analytic reveries on the right makes for something like a book of poetry in a bilingual edition. Except that the translations go in the opposite direction. The analytic episodes must have come before the translations into biblical terms in the author’s experience.

What happened in the analysis allowed the author to feel more authentically herself and to take good care of her inept and disabled mother. It also let her feel loved and loving. small changes in one sense, but huge changes in another. In that way it was like many other successful analyses, with specific symptom relief paired with a general change in attitude towards oneself and one’s place in the world. Continue reading Review of Evening Sessions with Dr. Priestly by Cathy Lobel