This work is an orientation to a craft of great richness and interest. The authors describe the defining elements of the accumulated working knowledge of psychodynamic psychotherapy. It revisits the raw pointedness of old questions: What is psychotherapy? What makes it meaningful? What do I say when a patient asks me how therapy works? How long will it take? How does change happen?

Angelica Kaner, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist and assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine. She is also a candidate at the Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis. Dr. Kaner received her Ph.D. at the University of California at Berkeley. She has interests in eating concerns and disorders, body image, creativity, and the teaching and supervision of psychotherapy. Ernst Prelinger, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist in the private practice of psychodynamic psychotherapy in New Haven, Connecticut. A clinical professor of psychology and psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine, he is also a member of the faculty at the Western New England Institute for Psychoanalysis. His special interests lie in teaching and supervising psychotherapists in training, the study of processes of identity formation and in the theory of aggression. He lives in rural Connecticut.