process.
Six tales of imaginary encounters between a psychoanalyst and her patients that dramatically illustrate what the experience
of psychoanalytic therapy is like from an analyst’s point of view. Orbach (Fat Is a Feminist Issue, not reviewed), cofounder of the Women's Therapy Centre in London and therapist for the late Princess Diana, has created a fictional therapist and seven fictional patients whose stories contain "emotional truths" distilled from her clinical experience. Interspersed with the stories, and set off from them, are the analyst’s musings, in which she pulls back from her involvement with the patient, thinks about her feelings, and examines their relationship to the therapeutic process. The first story, featuring sexually troubled Adam, explores the analyst’s response to a patient’s erotic attraction to her, and the second, in which manipulative Belle abruptly leaves therapy, examines the analyst’s feelings when confronted with a therapeutic failure. In Joanna's story, the analyst experiences real fear. In Edgar’s she has the feeling that her body becomes large, soft, and grandmotherly during her sessions with her patient, who has come to her for help with an eating disorder. In both cases, her experiences lead her to insights about her patient’s problems. There’s less involvement with Jenny, a young woman disillusioned by a shattering encounter with her biological mother, but in the final story, the analyst finds that her presence has a powerful impact on the relationship of Carol and Maria, two lesbians in couple therapy. The image of the psychoanalyst as a remote Freudian figure impassively taking notes is effectively banished by Orbach’s depiction of her analyst as involved and affected, constantly considering and reconsidering her own reactions, and then using the knowledge so gained to understand and help her patients. A revealing, often surprising glimpse into the mind and emotions of one analyst and her participation in the therapeutic
process.Pub Date: March 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-684-86426-6
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2000
BOOK REVIEW
An intriguing but strongly one-sided account.
Although scientists and philosophers don’t pretend to understand the neurological mechanism of human consciousness, they are eager to theorize about it. Donald (Psychology/Queen’s Univ., Toronto) reviews the evidence and explains how he believes the brain converts sensory input into awareness.
He begins by denouncing his opponents. According to the author, a school of evolutionary thinkers called the neo-Darwinians views human nature as fixed in genetic concrete. It follows from this that thinking, behavior, emotions, and language are hard-wired deep in our unconscious. Consciousness facilitates the working out of these mental processes, but it otherwise has little importance. The author disagrees vehemently with these “hardliners.” He proposes instead that the human mind occupies a unique place in nature, not because of its structure but through its ability to absorb culture (i.e., the interaction of many minds): human consciousness, according to this view, is actually a hybrid product of biology and culture. As a result, the key to understanding intellect is not the design of a single brain but the synergy of many brains. Marshalling studies from neuroscience as well as behavioral research on humans and animals, the author portrays consciousness as a revolutionary development central to human evolution, and he goes on to explain how the intellect might adapt to a future of increasingly symbolic technology. Although dense with closely reasoned argument, analysis, and theory, this study rewards careful reading—but it is also a heated polemic, full of sarcasm and dripping with contempt for the neo-Darwinians (whose arguments are made to seem extreme as well as weak).
An intriguing but strongly one-sided account.Pub Date: May 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-393-04950-7
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
You'd think Monty Python creator Cleese tackling health, happiness, and life after death would make for hilarious reading. Well, think again. Cleese and family therapist Skynner have followed their successful Families and How to Survive Them (not reviewed) with a dialogue on healthy mental living. The gist of their theory boils down to the need for the parent and child in each of us to be well integrated and flexible. In a rote repartee that consists of leading questions and summations, Cleese and Skynner apply their psychological analysis to individuals, families, corporations, nations, and societies. But even with ITT and Karl Marx on the proverbial couch, Cleese's occasional jokes fall flat. Bud Handelsman's cartoons, which depend too heavily on the text, provide the only comic edge—for while the give and take of discussion might be invaluable in therapy, it is tiresome to read. The book's rambling format is all the more distressing because some of Cleese and Skynner's points are solid. They touch on everything from child rearing to the recipe for happy marriage, as well as grief, work fulfillment, near-death experiences, the Holocaust, and the current mayhem in Somalia. They cite an equally wide a range of sources, from a 30-year study of Harvard students to Plato, Coleridge, and Dale Carnegie. Many of their conclusions—e.g., that sexual experience before marriage can demystify sex and prevent conjugal infidelity, or that strong, hands-off leadership makes for both good business and happy families—are pop-psych boilerplate. But Skynner's clinical experience gives such basic comments a bit more heft than they usually receive in popular magazines and on talk shows. If the ``Parent'' in the authors had been firmer with the ``Child'' and insisted on heavy editing and strong shaping, this work might have moved beyond self-help mediocrity.
Pub Date: Jan. 9, 1995
ISBN: 0-393-03742-8
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1994
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
