Sullivan Institute: Saul Newton & Jana Pearce

2 0 0

by asoapymessromances

by asoapymessromances

Saul B. Newton (June 25, 1906 –December 21, 1991) was a controversial psychotherapist who led anunorthodox therapy group in New York City. It had no formal name, butoutsiders referred to members as "The Sullivanians".

Background

Newton's original family name wasCohen. He was born in Saint John, New Brunswick, and attended theUniversity of Wisconsin.

Career

Newton went on to Chicago, where heassociated with radical circles at the University of Chicago,becoming a communist and anti-fascist. He served with theMackenzie–Papineau Battalion of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in theSpanish Civil War (as Saul Bernard Cohen). and with the U.S. Army inWorld War II by draft in 1943. He went on to study psychotherapyafter the war. Newton retained a dual focus on politics andpsychology throughout his life.

In 1957, Newton and his wife, Dr. JanePearce, founded the Sullivan Institute for Research in Psychoanalysisin New York. They had previously worked at the William Alanson WhiteInstitute, but left several years after the death of Harry StackSullivan, one of the White Institute's founders. Although Newton andPearce's institute was named after Sullivan, it was widely seen asoffering a distorted version of Sullivan's teaching.

The Institute's teachings held thattraditional family ties were the root cause of mental illness, andespoused a non-monogamous lifestyle. During the 1960s, an informalcommunity centered on the therapeutic practices of the Institutebegan to form. (Judy Collins chronicles her time with theSullivanians in her autobiography.). At its peak, in the late 1970s,this community had several hundred members (patients and therapists)living on the Upper West Side. The group gained some notoriety, notonly for its non-monogamous lifestyle, but because patients wereoften encouraged to sever ties with their families.

A major project was the Fourth WallRepertory Company (a.k.a. 'Fourth Wall Political Theater'),which performed from roughly 1976 to 1991. It was based in New York'sEast Village. Newton was a board member, and performed in severalproductions. Newton was also a producer of several documentariesdirected by Joan Harvey, Newton's fifth wife, an actress andpsychoanalyst.

Membership declined in the late 1980swhen the group was subject to unfavorable publicity, investigationsinto alleged professional misconduct by its therapists, high-profilechild custody cases (Paul Sprecher vs. Dee Dee Agee andMichael Bray vs. Alice Dobosh) and organized opposition bydisaffected former members who described the group as a"psychotherapy cult".

Newton was married and divorced sixtimes and had ten children, among them cultural anthropologist EstherNewton. He died in 1991 from sepsis, following the onset ofAlzheimer's disease.

Works

Conditions of Human Growth (withJane Pearce). Citadel Press, 1986, ISBN 0-8065-0177-4.