Learning From Experience

Wilfred R. Bion was one of the foremost psychoanalysts of his generation, whose work has shaped and enriched psychoanalysis and psychotherapy indelibly. Renowned for some highly original and sometimes cryptic ideas, such as the alpha function and theory of the grid , Learning from Experience is arguably his most important and enduring work. Bion brings knowledge into the psychoanalytic spotlight. What forces, he asks, interfere with knowledge? Crucially, Bion doesn't mean knowing only facts, but the lifelong process of understanding and coming to know things that is a consequence of the development of knowledge. However, Learning From Experience is perhaps best-known for its emphasis on the way emotion and knowledge are interwoven. Bion links the emotional capacity to develop and know to the capacity to tolerate frustration: if we can hold ourselves in check whilst we endure frustration, then we can come to know things. A remarkable and brilliant work by a fascinating psychoanalyst and thinker, Learning From Experience continues to inspire psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. This Routledge Classics edition includes a new Foreword by Robert Hinshelwood.

Wilfred R. Bion was one of the foremost psychoanalysts of his generation, whose work has shaped and enriched psychoanalysis and psychotherapy indelibly. Renowned for some highly original and sometimes cryptic ideas, such as the alpha function and theory of the grid , Learning from Experience is arguably his most important and enduring work. Bion brings knowledge into the psychoanalytic spotlight. What forces, he asks, interfere with knowledge? Crucially, Bion doesn't mean knowing only facts, but the lifelong process of understanding and coming to know things that is a consequence of the development of knowledge. However, Learning From Experience is perhaps best-known for its emphasis on the way emotion and knowledge are interwoven. Bion links the emotional capacity to develop and know to the capacity to tolerate frustration: if we can hold ourselves in check whilst we endure frustration, then we can come to know things. A remarkable and brilliant work by a fascinating psychoanalyst and thinker, Learning From Experience continues to inspire psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. This Routledge Classics edition includes a new Foreword by Robert Hinshelwood.

'As the problems raised in this book are fundamental to learning they have a long history of investigation and discussion. In phsycho-analytical practice, particularly with patients displaying symptoms of disorders of thought, it becomes clear that psycho-analysis has added a dimension to problems if not to their solution. 'This book deals with emotional experiences that are directly related both to theories of knowledge and to clinical psycho-analysis, and that in the most practical manner.'- Wilfred R. Bion, from the Introduction

'As the problems raised in this book are fundamental to learning they have a long history of investigation and discussion. In phsycho-analytical practice, particularly with patients displaying symptoms of disorders of thought, it becomes clear that psycho-analysis has added a dimension to problems if not to their solution. 'This book deals with emotional experiences that are directly related both to theories of knowledge and to clinical psycho-analysis, and that in the most practical manner.'- Wilfred R. Bion, from the Introduction