Based on over 25 years of research in psychology of art & om clinical psychoanalysis, these essays allow readers to follow the development of the author's thought. The absence of generalities & the careful documentation of observations makes this book especially useful to artists & psychoanalysts. Acknowledgments Preface Introduction Approaches to art The contribution of psychoanalysis & its limitations Daydream & fiction The aesthetic illusion Magic, communication & identification Creation & re-creation The image of the artist Psychological study of the role of tradition in ancient biographies The art of the insane Comments on spontaneous artistic creations by psychotics Appendix: a psychotic artist of the Middle Ages A psychotic sculptor of the 18th century The function of drawings & the meaning of the creative spell in a schizophrenic artist (w/Else Pappenheim) The comic The psychology of caricature The principles of caricature (w/E.H. Gombrich) Ego development & the comic Laughter as an expressive process: contributions to the psychoanalysis of expressive behavior Problems of literary criticism Aesthetic ambiguity (w/Abraham Kaplan) Freudianism & the literary mind Prince Hal's conflict Psychology of creative processes On inspiration On preconscious mental processes Bibliography Bibliographical Note Illustrations Index