Includes bibliographical references and index.

Originally published: as Melanie Klein for beginners. 1997.

Cover; Title Page; Copyright; Contents; Introducing Melanie Klein; Melanie's Childhood; Early Sorrows; Education and Marriage; A Destiny of Travel; Struggles with Libussa; The First World War; Analysis with Ferenczi; First Encounter with Child Analysis; The Little Hans Case; Early Contributions to Child Analysis; The Move to Berlin; The Pioneer, Hermine Hug-Hellmuth; Melanie's Work Begins; The Case of Ruth; Differences with Freud ... ; ... And Suspicions about Klein; The Bloomsbury Set; Acceptance in Britain; The Climate for Analysis in London; Origin of Klein's Object-relations; The Case of Peter.
Disputes BeginThe Problem of Transference; Totemic Fathers; Refining Freud's Theories; Tackling Psychotic Disorders: the Case of Dick; An Empty Space; Filling the Space with Symbols; The Case of John; The Depressive Position; Mourning and Melancholia; The Fate of the Lost Object; Loss and Creativity; Klein's Idea of Position; Understanding the Depressive Position; What Does Klein Mean by "Psychotic"?; So, What is the Depressive Position?; Taking Inside Oneself: Introjection; Timing the Super-Ego; Working From the Inner State; Internal Objects; A Case Example of Internal Objects.
Another Case Example: Unconscious PhantasyThe Combined Parent Figure; Externalizing the Internal; Reparation; The Good Object Inside: Richard's Response; Coming to Terms with Reality; The Pain of the Depressive Position; Persecutory Guilt; Projection and Introjection; Trouble in the Psycho-Analytical Society; A Three-Way Split; Klein's Interest in Psychotic Conditions; Part-Objects; The Bad Breast; Splitting the Ego; Projective Identification; Narcissism; Klein's View of Healthy Development; The Paranoid-Schizoid Position ... ; ... and the Death Instinct; Preconceptions.
The Fear of Death From WithinPersecutory Anxiety; A Projective Form of Identification; Transference; Counter-Transference; Bion's "Containing Function"; Repetition and the Death Instinct; Klein's Work on Envy; Defining Envy; Melanie Klein's Death; Melanie Klein's Continuing Lagacy; Klein and Group Therapy; Klein and Feminism; Klein and Lacan; Further Reading; Little Dictionary and Index; Acknowledgements.