[Foreword. "The best form of training to be found ..."]

Historically, the question of the training of analysts was not considered in terms of a selection in which the quality of the analysis of the future analyst could have been evaluated, but in terms of the specificity of this training and the possibility of imposing it upon whoever might want to claim himself to be an analyst. The shift from the notion of training towards that of transmission bespeaks the fact that the analytic thing remains forever out of reach, irreducible by essence to any form of knowledge.