Books
A short reading list, with one sentence on what each book is for.
W. R. D. Fairbairn · Routledge · 1952
The decisive move from drive to object. The person seeks relationship, not discharge.
Melanie Klein · Vintage Classics · 1957
The paranoid-schizoid and depressive positions in Klein's own late formulation.
W. R. Bion · Routledge · 1961
Basic assumption groups. Read as much in organisations now as in clinical training.
W. R. Bion · Routledge · 1962
Containment, alpha function, and thinking as something that has to be developed rather than assumed.
Hanna Segal · Routledge · 1964
The standard guide. Klein is difficult; Segal makes her teachable without flattening her.
D. W. Winnicott · Routledge · 1965
The good-enough mother, the true and false self, and the holding environment.
Michael Balint · Routledge · 1968
Regression as something that can be worked with rather than only managed.
W. R. Bion · Routledge · 1970
Memory, desire and the discipline of not knowing. The most demanding book on this list.
D. W. Winnicott · Routledge · 1971
Transitional objects and potential space. Winnicott at his most quoted and least dogmatic.
Melanie Klein · Vintage Classics · 1975
The early papers, including the play technique and the first accounts of internal objects.