His father, who died shortly after his birth, was a Jewish physician with an interest in dermatology and psychiatry; his mother was a gifted musician, who played the piano.
[6] Drawing on the work of Melanie Klein to integrate pre-oedipal and oedipal phases, Loewald saw internalization, when successful, as leading to complete detachment from the original object.
[7] Loewald's under-appreciated work on aesthetics and symbolism reflects this Kleinian orientation of bridging the pre-oedipal (paranoid-schizoid) with the oedipal (depressive position) era.
Freud saw guilt as something that should be evaded, Loewald regarded it as something that had to be worked through to complete the individuation process - the passing of the baton from one generation to the next.
[9] In Loewald's view the resolution of the Oedipus Complex involved symbolic destruction of the parents as libidinal objects [cite].