New Books In Psychoanalysis

Today I began my discussion with Dr. Adrian Perkel about his new book Unlocking The Nature of Human Aggression: A Psychoanalytic and Neuroscientific Approach (Routledge, 2024)  “Aggression is to the mind what the immune system is to the body. It doesn’t seek the fight.” With this perfect mind-body analogy Dr. Perkel proposes a clear way to think theoretically and work clinically with aggression. Throughout the book he links Freud’s formulations of the psyche with contemporary physics and biochemistry. Perkel’s assertion that “Where the aggressive drive goes, so therein lies the solution to many of the psychological problems that present to us in life” is broadly summarized in three essential points: 1. The aggressive drive in the human psyche has the aim of reducing stimuli and excitations brought on by internal and external impingements - it is not looking for a fight. 2. What constitutes a threat or impingement is not necessarily objective - in fact it is always filtered through subjective experience and th