Playing and Reality Revisited

Book excerpt: Playing and Reality Revisited is the first volume of a new IPA series dedicated to the greatest writings of psychoanalysis. More than forty years after its publication, Donald W. Winnicott's Playing and Reality is still a source of inspiration for numerous psychoanalysts. The authors have invited some of the most eminent specialists of Winnicott's thinking to write on the most significant themes that the author discovered and highlighted brillantly in his book. They show how such concepts as transitional object and phenomena, the use of an object, and mirroring, remain essential today, and explore the way in which Winnicott conceived playing, creativity, cultural experience and adolescence, demonstrating their contemporary relevance. This book is both an homage to Winnicott and a fascinating extension of his work.