Claudio Neri is Professor of `Theory and Technique of Group Dynamics' at the Faculty of Psychology, University of Rome. He is a member with teaching responsibilities of the Italian Psychoanalytic Society and the International Psychoanalytic Association. He is Supervisor of the Group Psychology service at the Centre for Medical Hygiene at the USL `Roma B', part of the Italy's National Health Service. He has been widely published, and is the editor of two professional journals.

• Preface, Parthenope Bion Talamo. Foreword, Malcolm Pines. Introduction. Historical Notes. PART ONE: ANALYTIC WORK 1. An Overall View. PART TWO: THE GROUP PROCESS 2. The Emerging Group State. The Fraternal Community Stage. 4. The Group's Common Space. 5. Genius Loci. PART THREE: THE FIELD 6. The Field. 7. Self Rrepresentation and Semiosphere. PART FOUR: GROUP THOUGHT 8. Brain Mind. 9. Characteristics of Group Thought. 10. Therapeutic Function of Group Thought. 11. Conditions for Group Thought. 12. Mimesis. 13. Oscillations between Emotions and Thought. PART FIVE: GROUP AND THE INDIVIDUAL 14. The Entry of New Members. 15. Group Experience on the Arrival of New Members. 16. The Group as Self-Object. 17. Effective Narration. 18. Transtemporal Diffusion. Appendix 1. The Group and the Psychological Mass. Appendix 2. The Transformation of the Group into an Institution. Appendix 3. Therapeutics in the Group. Glossary. Bibliography. Index.

This is an extremely interesting book which succeeds in combining erudition with great clarity, respect of tradition with a refreshing search for new perspectives [...] It is also a book which sums up the work carried out in Italy and in France and often ignored by the Anglo-Saxon group analyst. In line with such work it links Freud, Bion and Foulkes within a group perspective.