Perhaps not Unexpected, Perhaps not Death: A

Eulogy for Gianfranco Cecchin (19322004)

CARLOS E. SLUZKI

ianfranco Cecchin, that magician of a family therapist, surprised us once again,

this time through his unexpected death in a car accidentFone of those without a
clear perpetrator to blame or circumstances to attenuate. How to reframe this news?
How to tap in on his unusual gift for finding surprising angles, irreverent associations,
novel formulations, and topsy-turvy but plausible alternative descriptions of events so
as to help us transform the shock into the reasonable, the painful into the tolerable,
the no-way-out situation into a panoply of doors? Would he have remorphed the word
unexpected, making it, for instance, expected (a more philosophical approach
than our living as if forever), or welcome (perhaps for those of us afraid of a long,
lingering, painful agony), or competitive (maybe he wanted to beat Boscolo so as to
find a better seat in the Olympus of the dead and famous in the field of family therapy!), or selfish (just to join empathically with those of us who complain that his
death has robbed us of his always nourishing, joyful company)? Would he have suggested an alternative to death, proposing that his disappearing while in peak form
assures his steady presence among us for as long as his halo as a friend, a teacher, a
comrade in the forefront of the field of family therapy remains? Perhaps he would
have questioned the word accident, embarking into folk-epistemological and tightly
systemic disquisitions about whatever butterfly that moved its wings in whatever
Hong Kong so as to have that effect on him, his car, that road, that outcome. One way
or another, he would not have taken that information without transforming it magically into something else, something less painful than the news of his death, which
so many of us mourn.
Cecchin appeared in the field of family therapy as a member of the iconoclast team
led by Mara Selvini Palazzoli, together with Giuliana Prata and Luigi Boscolo. Originally a study group of psychoanalytically trained psychiatrists, guided by Maras
passionate if not stubborn drive and focus, they zeroed in on the work of Gregory
BatesonFnot studying it from outside, so to speak, but apprehending and enacting
that authors worldview with total orthodoxy and without concessions, exploring what
would be the consequences of working with families while being totally faithful with
his (Batesons) lens. And, by George, they did it, and the product was reflected in their
famous book Paradox and Counterparadox cited in the notes. That focus led the team
to contact the group that had defined Bateson as their mentor, namely, the Mental
Research Institute (MRI) in Palo Alto, California, and to invite Jay Haley and Paul
Watzlawick to visit their center in Milan and exchange notes. That opened new doors,
and led to the teams first visit to the Ackerman Institute and to the MRI in the late
1970s. And then came Hypothesizing, circularity, neutrality: Three guidelines for
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FAMILY PROCESS

the conductor of the session. That extraordinary article, published where else but in
Family Process in 1980 (19[1]: 312), took the field by storm. It boldly shifted the focus
of the reader from the family to the operations by the family therapists, highlighting
how their models had affected their logic and their clinical behavior. While being
centered on their practice, the family was, up to a point, absent in that article: The
protagonist was the therapists theories-in-action (borrowing Donald Schons term).
This article contributed to set in motion a shift in the whole field toward a new level of
systemic understanding of the family plus the therapist as a system.
After that, bridges were quickly established between Milan and North American
family therapists. Lynn Hoffman, Peggy Penn, Karl Tomm, and many others enriched
and articulated for this side of the Atlantic the contributions of that team, and when
the original team divided, of Gianfranco and Luigi Boscolo. Over the years, their work
Centro Milanese di Terapia della Famiglia became one of the worlds key training
hubs and established Cecchin as one of the most influential trainers, with particularly
strong presence in his own country, the Baltic countries, the United Kingdom, the
Americas, and down under. CecchinFpast president of the Italian Society for Systemic Research, which he was instrumental in creatingFwas a steady animator of
international conferences and a tireless conductor of workshops, training programs,
and conferences. And his clinical creativity was endless. Seeing him conducting an
interview with a family, a couple, or an individual was a cognitive and esthetic pleasure, with his slightly detached and immutable but tender style, and his unintrusive
and constantly ingenious way of exploring the many angles of a storys reality.
Gianfranco was clear in his referential frame and extremely articulate in the way he
drew bridges between his practice and its guiding models. My sense is that his cognitive style of pushing the envelope clashed with the formal restraints of a written
delivery. In fact, the ratio between his creativity and his writing production is rather
low, or at least many of us and he himself so complained. Or is it that I (we) want more
of him, especially now? In fact, he authored a number of books collaboratively,1 contributed chapters to a number of other volumes, and wrote some extraordinary articles, among which his illuminating Hypothezising, circularity, neutrality
reconsidered: An invitation to curiosity, again in Family Process (26[4]: 405415,
1987), not to mention the thousands of videotaped hours of therapy and teaching that
cover the walls of the Centro Milanese and of so many other training institutions.
Gianfranco was a generous teacher, a respectful collaborator, and a warm friend.
His intense self and his boundless curiosity and imagination poured daily into his training activities, in doing therapy with many of us behind the one-way mirror, discussing those sessions, in watching and discussing others interviews and conversing
1
Selvini Palazzoli, M., Boscolo, L., Cecchin. G., & Prata, G. (1978). Paradox and counterparadox:
A new model in the therapy of the family in schizophrenic transaction. New York: Jason Aronson.
Boscolo, L., Cecchin, G., Hoffman, L., & Penn, P. (1987). Milan systemic family therapy: Conversations in theory and practice. New York: Basic Books.
Cecchin, G., Lane, G., & Ray, W. (1992). IrreverenceFA strategy for therapists survival. London:
Karnak.
Cecchin, G., Lane, G., & Ray, W. (1994). Cybernetics of prejudices in the practices of psychotherapy. London: Karnak.
In addition, Gary Lane and Wendell Ray have been working recently with Cecchin on a new
book, further spelling out his models and practices, a project that, alas, will have to be finished
without him.

www.FamilyProcess.org

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collegially in colloquia, round tables, seminars, and just chatting during endlessly
stimulating evenings, wine glass in hand. In fact, upon his departure, we should
convene his broad international network of friends, colleagues, disciples, and collaborators, and organize a huge party to celebrate his joy for life, the fireworks of his
sparkling mind, and the gift of his connection, not to mention his contributions to the
field. He deserves that. We will miss him terribly. We miss him already.

Fam. Proc., Vol. 43, June, 2004