Marriage and Its Discontents: Variations, Vexations, and Violations

About the Editor(s)

Salman Akhtar, MD, is professor of psychiatry at Jefferson Medical College and a training and supervising analyst at the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia. He has served on the editorial boards of the International Journal of Psychoanalysis and the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association. His more than 450 publications include twenty-three solo authored books – Broken Structures (1992), Quest for Answers (1995), Inner Torment (1999), Immigration and Identity (1999), New Clinical Realms (2003), Objects of Our Desire (2005), Regarding Others (2007), Turning Points in Dynamic Psychotherapy (2009), The Damaged Core (2009), Comprehensive Dictionary of Psychoanalysis (2009), Immigration and Acculturation (2011), Matters of Life and Death (2011), Psychoanalytic Listening (2013), Good Stuff (2013), Sources of Suffering (2014), No Holds Barred (2016), A Web of Sorrow (2017), Mind, Culture, and Global Unrest (2018), Silent Virtues (2019), Tales of Transformation (2022), In Leaps and Bounds (2022), and In Short (2024) – as well as sixty-nine edited or coedited volumes in psychiatry and psychoanalysis. Dr. Akhtar has delivered many prestigious addresses and lectures including, most significantly, the inaugural address at the first IPA-Asia Congress in Beijing, China (2010). Dr. Akhtar is the recipient of the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association’s Best Paper of the Year Award (1995), the Margaret Mahler Literature Prize (1996), the American Society of Psychoanalytic Physicians’ Sigmund Freud Award (2000), the American College of Psychoanalysts’ Laughlin Award (2003), the American Psychoanalytic Association’s Edith Sabshin Award (2000), Columbia University’s Robert Liebert Award for Distinguished Contributions to Applied Psychoanalysis (2004), the American Psychiatric Association’s Kun Po Soo Award (2004), the Irma Bland Award for being the Outstanding Teacher of Psychiatric Residents in the country (2005), and the Nancy Roeske Award (2012). He received the Sigourney Award (2013), which is the most prestigious honor in the field of psychoanalysis. Dr. Akhtar is an internationally sought speaker and teacher, and his books have been translated in many languages, including German, Turkish, and Romanian. His interests are wide and he has served as the film review editor for the International Journal of Psychoanalysis, and is currently serving as the book review editor for the International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies. He has published eighteen collections of poetry and serves as a scholar-in-residence at the Inter-Act Theatre Company in Philadelphia. His Selected Papers (Vols I–X) were recently published and released at a festive event held at the Freud House & Museum in London.

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Ann Eichen, Ph.D., is a licensed psychologist and psychoanalyst. She received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the Derner Institute of Advanced Psychological Studies, and she completed her postdoctoral work at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Dr. Eichen is on the faculty at the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia. Her interests include female psychological development and the nature and function of love relationships on development throughout the lifespan. She has a private practice in Wynnewood, PA, where she provides individual, couples, and group psychotherapy. She has also served as a divorce mediator in Montgomery County. Recently, she has discovered a passion for painting and is studying art with local teachers.

Andrew I. Smolar, M.D. is training and supervising analyst at the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia and clinical associate professor of psychiatry at Temple University School of Medicine, also in Philadelphia, PA. He has been in the private practice of adolescent and adult psychiatry in Wynnewood, PA since 1998. He specializes in psychoanalysis, combining psychoanalytic psychotherapy and medication treatments, couples therapy, and group therapy. He has led groups in his practice, as well as groups for residents of psychiatry and Albert Einstein Medical Center (Philadelphia) Hospice staff. He has supervised residents and psychology interns, psychiatrists, and psychoanalysts in training; he also served as consulting psychiatrist to several local colleges, including his alma mater Haverford College from 2000–2011.

Dr. Smolar served as president of the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia from 2015–2017; he has also served there as chairman of the Education Committee, Training and Supervising Analyst Committee, cochair of the Supervision Study Group for Supervising Analysts, and is codirector of the Developmental Pathway for recent graduates. Dr. Smolar has contributed to the academic literature by writing on the following subjects: analytic work with an immigrant analysand, group therapy in various clinical settings, gift-giving in group and individual settings, combining analytic treatment with group therapy techniques, and most recently, psychotherapy during this era of political turmoil and contributions of group fragmentation toward national discord. He is coinvestigator of research of American citizens suffering from conspiracy thinking. His article in press for the American Journal of Psychoanalysis addresses group identifications during individual development and techniques for including them during psychoanalytic clinical work. He has also published op-eds on mental health subjects in the Philadelphia Inquirer and in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review, where he is a regular contributor.

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