Reappraising W innicott's T he P iggle : A Critical Commentary

This is the second part of an extended paper reviewing the nature of the messages W innicott wished to communicate to his audience through the psychoanalytic case of T he   P iggle . ‘ I ntroduction and the T reatment’ (published in BJP 31[2]) set out the work in its theoretical and historical context and reviewed the dialogue which serves as the material for the work. This part provides a discussion and a critical analysis of the case, and an examination of both explicit and less worked‐out conclusions which can be drawn from it. The author considers the case as evidence that therapy with a child can be intensive without being extensive. He highlights W innicott's emphasis on the importance of play for working through internal conflicts, not merely as providing material for interpretation. Whereas W innicott held firmly to the efficacy of his commotional interpretations, and the notion that G abrielle's unconscious dispositions were agentive and intentional, the author argues for an alternative to W innicott's interpretation, highlighting the use of make‐believe play, the irregular timing of the sessions and the child's own maturational processes as being important elements in her recovery. He suggests that, for W innicott, these factors were intuitively, rather than conceptually worked out, and, in so being, contribute to the enigmatic nature of the original work.