Josh Cohen (psychoanalyst)

Josh Cohen (born 1970) is a British psychoanalyst, academic and author.^[1] Between 1996 and 2024, he taught in the English department at Goldsmiths, University of London, where he was appointed Professor of Modern Literary Theory in 2010.^[2] He was elected to Membership of the British Psychoanalytical Society in 2009, and to Fellowship in 2014.^[3]

His essays have appeared in Granta,^[4] Aeon (magazine),^[5] The Yale Review^[6] and 1843 (magazine).^[7] He has written articles and reviews for The Guardian,^[8] The Times Literary Supplement,^[9] New Statesman^[10] and Prospect (magazine).^[11] He has published eight books and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.^[12]

Critical reception

Reviews of Cohen’s books have been generally positive. His 2013 book The Private Life was praised for its writing and ideas by The Guardian,^[13] The Daily Telegraph^[14] and The Observer,^[15] while The Independent was more critical, considering it at times ‘dry and protracted’.^[16] Not Working (2019) received enthusiastic reviews from The Guardian,^[17] The New Statesman,^[18] Literary Review^[19] and The Financial Times,^[20] and a more mixed review from The Observer.^[21] How to Live. What to Do (2021) was very positively reviewed by the TLS^[22] and Kirkus Reviews,^[23] while Publishers Weekly felt its discussion of literature was weakened by its favouring ‘overwhelmingly white, western authors’.^[24]

Works

• Spectacular Allegories: Postmodern American Writing and the Politics of Seeing (Pluto Press,1998, 9780745312071)
• Interrupting Auschwitz: Art, Religion, Philosophy, published by (Continuum, 2003, 9780826455512)
• How to Read Freud, (Granta, 2005, 9781862077638)
• The Private Life: Why We Remain in the Dark. (Granta, 2013, 9781847085290); American edition, The Private Life: Our Everyday Self in an Age of Intrusion (Counterpoint, 2014, 978161902497)
• Lament (with Bettina von Zwehl, accompanying text to artbook produced by von Zwehl for her Freud Museum exhibition) (Art/ Books, 2017, 9781908970275)
• Not Working: Why We Have to Stop  (Granta, 2019, 9781783782062)
• How to Live. What to Do: In Search of Ourselves in Life an Literature (Ebury, 2021, 9781785039805)
• Losers (Peninsula, 2021, 9781999922344)
• All the Rage: Why Anger Drives the World (Granta, 2024, 9781783789450)