"Dawn Skorczewski explores this explosive material with delicacy and a sensitive hand. While An Accident of Hope limns the contours of Anne Sexton's deep-seated emotions – both the joy and the anguish – and the intertwined roots of her poetry, it simultaneously gives us a compelling read that never, ever, disappoints." - Linda Gray Sexton, author of Half in Love: Surviving the Legacy of Suicide and Searching for Mercy Street: My Journey Back to My Mother: Anne Sexton "By combining close readings of Anne Sexton's poems, mid-20th-century cultural history, and reflections on the development of psychoanalytic theory and technique, Dawn Skorczewski has produced a richly contextualized interpretive account of the audio recordings of the last six months of the poet's treatment with psychiatrist Martin Orne. An Accident of Hope amply demonstrates the mutually generative potential of literary and psychoanalytic texts and methodologies, while also reinforcing our sense of the propriety of Freud's oft-cited avowal that, wherever he went, he found that a poet had gotten there before him. Toggling back and forth between Sexton's poems and her taped conversations with Orne, Skorczewski reveals that, in certain ways, Sexton had a more forward-looking understanding than her doctor did of the psychotherapeutic relationship as a creative partnership." - Max Cavitch, University of Pennsylvania, USA "In An Accident of Hope, worlds creatively collide. Skorczewski composes a contrapuntal work of great force that resonates on several levels at once. Poems comment on intimate therapy encounters, and the encounters themselves reveal a patient trying to teach her beloved therapist how to listen to her and a therapist teetering between sexist and rigid theoretical analytic paradigms and a desire to nurture the creative human being in his care. Masterfully—and lyrically—connecting Sexton's poems, therapy sessions, and the therapeutic and cultural norms of the time, Skorczewski tells the tale of a great poet, a traumatized and traumatizing woman, and a patient whose challenges to her therapist foreshadow relational understandings of what harms and what heals." - Lynne Layton, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts, USA "Dawn Skorczewski's responsiveness to the psychoanalytic narrative invites readers into an affecting study of the inner lives of men and women. With sophistication, care, and a literary style that makes for compelling reading, she draws readers into Dr. Martin Orne's tape recorded clinical treatment of the poet Anne Sexton. It is an unusual record of poetry and life woven from the fragility of creativity between the poet and the analyst. Nested in this commentary are the erotic tensions between North American psychoanalysis and the arts in the 1960s. Through the painful complications of childhood, adulthood, and illness, Skorczewski writes of love, hate, and sexuality; there is rare attunement to the backstage of lives in search of meaning. And new questions follow: Must one choose between art and life or between poetry and therapy? This book promises to open significant debate on the emotional conflicts of the imagination." - Deborah P. Britzman, York University, UK, and author of Freud and Education "An Accident of Hope offers the reader insight into the workings of the mind of a patient who is fully aware of the importance of her relationship with her therapist, not only to free her from her demons but to give birth to her poetic creativity. Dawn Skorczewski succeeded in writing a book that is instructive, entertaining, and a captivating read. It is instructive because of the author's appreciation of how psychoanalytic theory of the 1960s had affected this treatment, and because in interpreting Sexton's poems she was able to establish the connection between Sexton's increasing insights into her turbulent inner world and what her poetry was successfully communicating. The easy, conversational style of writing is experienced as if the reader were a third person in Dr. Orne's consulting room. This is an extraordinary book that psychoanalysts and literary critics will find equally rewarding." - Anna Ornstein, University of Cincinnati, USA "An Accident of Hope is a rich and far-ranging text that covers such diverse topics as creativity, identity, narrative, the history of psychiatry/psychology, and the history of feminism. Skorczewski’s explorations touch upon very fundamental questions of identity and creativity." –PsycCRITIQUES "Dawn Skorczewski explores this explosive material with delicacy and a sensitive hand. While An Accident of Hope limns the contours of Anne Sexton's deep-seated emotions – both the joy and the anguish – and the intertwined roots of her poetry, it simultaneously gives us a compelling read that never, ever, disappoints." - Linda Gray Sexton, author of Half in Love: Surviving the Legacy of Suicide and Searching for Mercy Street: My Journey Back to My Mother: Anne Sexton "By combining close readings of Anne Sexton's poems, mid-20th-century cultural history, and reflections on the development of psychoanalytic theory and technique, Dawn Skorczewski has produced a richly contextualized interpretive account of the audio recordings of the last six months of the poet's treatment with psychiatrist Martin Orne. An Accident of Hope amply demonstrates the mutually generative potential of literary and psychoanalytic texts and methodologies, while also reinforcing our sense of the propriety of Freud's oft-cited avowal that, wherever he went, he found that a poet had gotten there before him. Toggling back and forth between Sexton's poems and her taped conversations with Orne, Skorczewski reveals that, in certain ways, Sexton had a more forward-looking understanding than her doctor did of the psychotherapeutic relationship as a creative partnership." - Max Cavitch, University of Pennsylvania, USA "In An Accident of Hope, worlds creatively collide. Skorczewski composes a contrapuntal work of great force that resonates on several levels at once. Poems comment on intimate therapy encounters, and the encounters themselves reveal a patient trying to teach her beloved therapist how to listen to her and a therapist teetering between sexist and rigid theoretical analytic paradigms and a desire to nurture the creative human being in his care. Masterfully—and lyrically—connecting Sexton's poems, therapy sessions, and the therapeutic and cultural norms of the time, Skorczewski tells the tale of a great poet, a traumatized and traumatizing woman, and a patient whose challenges to her therapist foreshadow relational understandings of what harms and what heals." - Lynne Layton, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts, USA "Dawn Skorczewski's responsiveness to the psychoanalytic narrative invites readers into an affecting study of the inner lives of men and women. With sophistication, care, and a literary style that makes for compelling reading, she draws readers into Dr. Martin Orne's tape recorded clinical treatment of the poet Anne Sexton. It is an unusual record of poetry and life woven from the fragility of creativity between the poet and the analyst. Nested in this commentary are the erotic tensions between North American psychoanalysis and the arts in the 1960s. Through the painful complications of childhood, adulthood, and illness, Skorczewski writes of love, hate, and sexuality; there is rare attunement to the backstage of lives in search of meaning. And new questions follow: Must one choose between art and life or between poetry and therapy? This book promises to open significant debate on the emotional conflicts of the imagination." - Deborah P. Britzman, York University, UK, and author of Freud and Education "An Accident of Hope offers the reader insight into the workings of the mind of a patient who is fully aware of the importance of her relationship with her therapist, not only to free her from her demons but to give birth to her poetic creativity. Dawn Skorczewski succeeded in writing a book that is instructive, entertaining, and a captivating read. It is instructive because of the author's appreciation of how psychoanalytic theory of the 1960s had affected this treatment, and because in interpreting Sexton's poems she was able to establish the connection between Sexton's increasing insights into her turbulent inner world and what her poetry was successfully communicating. The easy, conversational style of writing is experienced as if the reader were a third person in Dr. Orne's consulting room. This is an extraordinary book that psychoanalysts and literary critics will find equally rewarding." - Anna Ornstein, University of Cincinnati, USA "Skorczewski’s work with the transcripts of Sexton’s private therapy sessions refuses any prurient interest the reader may have in Sexton’s flamboyant character—or the melodramatic features of her suicide. With her extensive knowledge of psychoanalytic theory, Skorczewski is able to make lucid comparisons between Orne’s clinical approach, which relied heavily on Freudian theory and its later expression as ego psychology, and contemporary theories of analysis that she argues provide superior modalities for treating mental illness and depression." - Judith Harris, DIVISION | REVIEW WINTER 2014