New York Times Interview
A Psychoanalyst Lets Us Eavesdrop
Stephen Grosz’s books show a new generation the inner workings of psychoanalysis.
By Daphne Merkin
March 3, 2026
To many of us, what goes on in analysis or psychotherapy remains a well-guarded mystery, and its practitioners mythical creatures, bearers of special wisdom — or, if we are skeptical enough about the profession’s effectiveness, like Wizards of Oz behind the curtain. In his new book, “Love’s Labor,” Stephen Grosz, an American-born psychoanalyst who has practiced in London since 1987, breaks the spell by taking us directly into the sanctum sanctorum, otherwise known as the analyst’s office.
One of the most gripping, curvy stories in the book, which comprises 12 case studies about love and intimacy (all of which, to a greater or lesser degree, are fictionalized), is called “Connections.” It involves two married couples, three members of whom are psychoanalysts from New York and close friends. Grosz, then in his early 40s and unmarried, first meets them at a conference of American and European analysts in Cork, Ireland, and continues to see them over the next six years at other meetings. Both couples are “appealing people” who seem content in their lives, until it suddenly emerges at a meeting in Glasgow that one of the women, Cora, is sleeping with the husband of the other woman, Susan.
This development leads to an all-out confrontation between the two women at a cafe. Susan calls Cora a “sociopath” and accuses her of not understanding what being a psychoanalyst is about: “Mending. Repairing. Having empathy. Caring for others. Respecting boundaries.” Cora hits back: “You don’t sound like a psychoanalyst. You sound like some old rabbi.” And she insists that the true aim of psychoanalysis is allowing a person to acknowledge their real desires, however difficult or inconvenient, so that they can live more freely and truthfully. As Cora pleads with her to understand things from her perspective, Susan slaps down some money and walks away.
Both women confide in Grosz the details of the fight, and a year later his friends’ furious disagreement about the purpose of psychoanalysis still disturbs him, so much so that he is prompted to try to refine his own definition of it. He makes a list of different ideas that have struck him from his reading and training, among them: to make what is unconscious conscious (Freud); to break the spell of self-deception (Amadeo Limentani); to tolerate ambivalent feelings and experience the world with less fear and fragmentation (Melanie Klein); to wrest knowledge from suffering (Jonathan Lear).
None of these are fully satisfying: Grosz finds himself questioning the very notion of an “aim” in psychoanalysis. It seems to him that insisting upon one is “an intrusion on the patient’s autonomy — an attack on the power to identify one’s own desires, decide one’s own mind.” In the end, the friendship between Grosz and the two couples fizzles out, but what lingers is his respect for both Susan’s and Cora’s points of view and curiosity about how psychoanalysis might help them bear their rage, disappointment and colliding needs.
This vignette, and the circling approach to its subject, coming in close and lifting off for a more aerial view, is typical of Grosz. His capacity for self-interrogation, and for constantly turning over in his mind what the role of an analyst should be, characterizes all of the case studies in “Love’s Labor.” Grosz, who is 73, first became well known to readers in 2013 when he published “The Examined Life: How We Lose and Find Ourselves.” Based on 25 years of his work with patients, the book, a collection of 31 case studies, became a critically acclaimed best seller in England and went on to sell nearly half a million copies worldwide, as well as being translated into more than 30 languages.