Patrick Casement obtained his degree at Cambridge University, in anthropology and theology. He then trained to become a social worker, subsequently becoming an analytical psychotherapist and then a psychoanalyst and training analyst with British Psychoanalytical Society. His first book On Learning from the Patient (1985) became an international best seller in the field of psychoanalysis. A later book, Learning from Our Mistakes (2002), was awarded a Gradiva Award in America for its contribution to psychoanalysis. His last book Learning from Life: becoming a psychoanalyst (2006) is partly autobiographical - an unusual step for an analyst but one he felt able to take since retiring.