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Esther Bick (Nusia) was
born of Jewish parents in Poland and trained with Charlotte Buhler. Most of her immediate family died
in the holocaust; however Bick reached London in 1938 and began to work with
Melanie Klein, with whom she later had analysis. John Bowlby of the Tavistock Clinic asked Bick to
provide a training course for analysts, and she developed a course founded
on infant observation, with a view to enhancing the capacity to perceive
the primitive and fundamental psychic realities of the concrete inner world
described by Klein. She
regarded this capacity as essential equally for the psychoanalysis of
adults. When she left the
Tavistock this course was taken over and fully developed by Martha Harris,
of whom Donald Meltzer writes:
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If ever anyone had Ògreatness thrust upon themÓ, it
was the reluctant Mattie at the time when Mrs Bick left the Clinic and it
was either up to Mattie to take over or let the infant Child
Psychotherapy Course fade away. The way in which she came to terms with
this crisis in her life É was by framing a radical pedagogical
method. Read more
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Martha Harris and Donald
Meltzer together promoted BickÕs infant observation techniques in relation
to analytic training and therapy in other countries, in particular
Argentina, Italy and France.
Esther Bick herself taught regularly in Novara, Italy. The ÔCentro Studii Martha HarrisÕ
were subsequently founded by Gianna Polacco Williams and established even
more widely as the basis of training courses.
In addition to her
training methods, Esther Bick is renowned for her theories about the
significance of the skin in infancy (recorded in her few publications/
which have proved to be extremely influential amongst clinicians, both
those she supervised personally and those who experience her insights via
the courses modelled on her methods.
See also: Martha Harris, ÔEsther Bick
(1901-1983)Õ, Journal of Child Psychotherapy 9, pp. 101-102
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