Tribute to Neville Symington

By Ruth Safier.

Neville Symington was a big man with a large personality and a very big presence in Psychoanalysis. We were fortunate to have him and Joan in Sydney for all the years after his time in London - and at a time when he was bursting with independent ideas and creativity

Those of us who came into the training after he was well established in Sydney - knew how fortunate we were. In the 1980s -most candidates were older than they are currently - most had been through multiple supervisions, trainings etc already - and so Neville’s iconoclastic ideas were both shocking and very welcome.

He brought the larger world of PA into Sydney - through his writings, supervision, teaching - but also through the many friends and colleagues he introduced to the society.

Inevitably there were frequently strong feelings and disagreements around him -but Neville rarely shied away from controversy and as a result the SIP became more open and far less doctrinaire than it had been

Against a good deal of resistance he launched the SIP and the Branch into opening up the didactic part of our training to a wider public. “The Public Lectures" as they were known, were an innovation that hauled almost every member in our small society into active participation in training and outreach - by preparing and then presenting papers to a large audience. Before then only a few members were regular writers or presenters.

Neville encouraged, stimulated, read and discussed our work etc and he attended and chaired every lecture over the next 4 years - a year longer than the initial brief.

The Tuesday evening lectures became a focal point on the Sydney Psychoanalytic and psychotherapy scene. They were never repeated, but the psychoanalytic world had changed in Sydney very significantly as a result.

Neville had a tireless and relentlessly questing and questioning mind. He was prodigiously well read, with the most widespread and deep interests from religion, philosophy, literature, history, politics, art etc. He spoke continuously about the enormous value of studying great minds

He was generous with all his thoughts, very generous and encouraging to young analysts. He could be counted on to be always present at any paper given by a member of our group - in any setting – he was often the only member of our group to be present.

Over the years I encountered NS in many different settings - as a candidate and supervisee, and then as a colleague on a variety of committees and peer groups and special interest groups.

Neville always used the larger group to listen to and work on his ideas. The books that kept on coming often made their first appearances like this - the books on Narcissism, or the Spirit of Sanity or Patterns of Madness for instance.

Perhaps one of the most significant series of seminars he gave was The clinical Significance of the Work of Wilfred Bion – based on the book of that name co-authored with Joan - and given in several series of public lectures in Sydney and Melbourne and elsewhere

The atmosphere in these lecture series was always one of intellectual excitement - with thoughts that resonated for weeks and months and probably over analytic working life times

These larger groups spawned smaller working groups and had a profound influence on our therapeutic and academic work

As an example of his style - when a small group of us were struggling with a particular concept - of Bion's Psychoanalytic Object - we were tasked with presenting our ideas at an annual conference

Over the years there were many examples of this gentle and sometimes not so gentle nudging to present our own ideas and working through

Some of the last groups he chaired - were focused on ideas about the essence of psychoanalysis, the most fundamental questions about freedom , about what constituted healing conversations and around the questions of how one IS as a analyst in the room with a patient. The psychotherapy of Psychotic patients was an enduring interest.

Joan was always in attendance in these groups where the two of them made their own thoughts and observations very clear in their very different ways

Sorting out some old papers just recently -- I found a lot of correspondence with Neville. Typically there would be an email after a presentation of clinical work - or a lecture - with "second thoughts" - - usually late at night or very early in the morning - always stimulating and always useful . Reading through these informal communications again - was a reminder of how continuously open to people's work and experiences he always was - how nothing was ever completed or closed, but rather always pushing further and deeper.

Writing about this complex man brings up - yet again such deep gratitude - tinged with sadness about his loss to myself, our society and to psychoanalysis.