A Great Loss, a Great Woman: Lebanese American Anne Alonso

Dr. Anne Alonso, professor, psychologist, teacher, mentor, passed away this past Sunday in Boston, MA. To understand Anne’s spirit, and why it is so sorely missed, a quote from the Fieldings Institute’s 2001 alumni newsletter is a good starting point. Faculty member Sam Osherson recalls of Anne:

One year she convinced me to do “one-minute analyses” on the patio at La Casa as part of a fundraiser for student scholarships. There we were, she and I, two analysts set up behind deck chairs, and for $1 we ‘analyzed’ students and their problems in one minute. You can imagine how wacky it got!

It is just like Anne to put aside her many accolades, titles and awards to try on being Lucy from Charlie Brown for a day, and get a big kick out of doing it. For someone with a formidable career and hundreds if not thousands of students and mentees over the years, Anne had a wicked sense of humor and never took life too seriously–though she certainly expected life to take her seriously.

Born into a family of Maronite Christian Lebanese immigrants in Waltham, MA, Anne grew up speaking both English and Arabic, commuting long hours to Emerson college by day and returning to her family by night. After getting into a Master’s program in psychology at Harvard and then continuing on for a doctorate, Anne’s dedication to her work and her obvious skill gradually made her one of the country’s most distinguished clinical practitioners, especially in the field of group psychology which she helped pioneer. She married Ramon Alonso, an engineer and mathematician who helped design the Apollo spacecraft’s landing module and still works as a management consultant; at the time of her death they had been married 49 years, had watched two daughters grow up, and were happily obsessed with their three grandchildren.

Not many people knew Anne’s background. My father, a longtime friend and colleague of Anne’s, tells that some years ago her students, wanting to stump their “perfect” professor of psychodynamic psychotherapy, decided to bring a family who spoke no English in for an observed clinical interview with the “Latina” Professor Alonso. They sat chortling on the other side of the one-way mirror to watch, certain that she would be flummoxed by this immigrant family. The interview began, and the family members began speaking Arabic. Not missing a beat, Anne broke into fluent Lebanese dialect and conducted the entire interview in Arabic while her students sat, dumbfounded, not understanding a single word.

One of Anne’s passions was mentoring people, which is why scores of people showed up at her house this Monday and Tuesday with tears brimming over and stories to tell. It was a surprise for them all to meet; Anne had made each person she had taught or coached or counseled feel so special, so appreciated by her, that it was hard to believe how many there could be. Together it almost seemed we could piece her back together, conjure up her energy and her signature husky laugh. I have never been as gratified by someone’s laughter as I have been by hers; it was the laughter of a hundred people coming out of one short body.

Anne’s obituary will probably read something like this:

Anne Alonso, professor of clinical psychology at Harvard Medical School, recipient awards from the American Psychiatric Association, the American Group Psychotherapy Association, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the US Psychiatric and Mental Congress, author of The Quiet Profession and Group Therapy in Clinical Practice as well as scores of essays on the practice of psychodynamic psychotherapy, passed away this Thursday at the age of 73.

Having grown up with Anne as a surrogate aunt, here are my bootleg additions:

Anne Alonso knew how to shuck a Cape Cod oyster and appreciate it raw, how to bluff just about anyone living at penny-ante five card stud, how to cook Lebanese food that tasted as if it was airlifted from Beirut and then conduct an informal salon on politics and therapy that had everyone present doubled over in helpless laughter at more than one point in the conversation. Anne was certainly a no bull**** kind of woman. It is her razor-sharp judgement and intellect, her deep caring, and her voice that has guided so many of us, and will continue to guide us, through the vagaries and uncertainties of life.

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