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had generalized from individual aggression to European anti-Semi–
tism - by noting the parallel between apes' "grooming" behavior
and the human separation trauma: the Central European nations–
Austria, Germany, Hungary-suffered inordinate numbers of
separations due to constantly changing borders imposed upon
them, and then "turned the aggressive impulse acquired through
these separation traumas into themselves ." These nations , Hermann
had held, managed to abreact the trauma by trying to "excom–
municate the Jewish minority." Such a truncated summary, of
course, cannot do justice to the complexity of either Hermann's or
Vikar's argument . But the contention that aggressive impulses and
destructive fantasies may be rooted in inhibited, early behavior,
though accepted by all Freudians, appears to playa more central
role in the Hungarians' work with patients.
Sara Klaniczay, for instance , assumed inordinately strong
repressed feelings of aggressions in a quiet, twelve year-old psycho–
somatic patient. By drawing him out through games and dramatiza–
tions of early memories , she was able to cure him. With this boy, as
well as with a six year-old who had to learn to express and then limit
his aggression , she found Hermann's theory of instinctual aggression
invaluable .
Judith Szekacs told us about the impact of the Holocaust on the
psychic life of a twenty-four year-old patient whose parents had been
in concentration camps, and who had incorporated her family's con–
flicts , idealizations, and projections. In the East European existence
and psychodynamics, stated Szekacs, where dreadful events, chang–
ing perceptions of values, fears of police, and massive destruction
and hatred had become the norm, depersonalization and all sorts of
ego disorders are bound to flourish. Thus, psychoanalysis , though
forbidden , is needed .
Klara Ajkay elaborated on Ferenczi's methods , on his in–
sistence that early trauma could be alleviated with the help of the
countertransference (the analyst's emotional reaction to the patient).
Rather than perceiving it as a negative component during the psy–
choanalytic process, demonstrated Ajkay, Ferenczi expected to put
the dynamics of the countertransference, along with its interaction
with the patient's transference, to therapeutic advantage. He em–
phasized the need for honesty and candidness ; and he accepted what
now are called narcissistic and borderline cases at a time these were
thought uncurable. Thus Ajkay proved him to have been the first
proponent of the object-relations approach to psychoanalytic treat-
