Book Description

"[Slater has] the playful mind of a philosopher and the exquisite, unique voice of a poet." (The Washington Post Book World)

In this powerful and provocative new memoir, award-winning author Lauren Slater forces readers to redraw the boundary between what we know as fact and what we believe through the creation of our own personal fictions. Mixing memoir with mendacity, Slater examines memories of her youth, when after being diagnosed with a strange illness she developed seizures and neurological disturbances-and the compulsion to lie. Openly questioning the reliability of memoir itself, Slater presents the mesmerizing story of a young woman who discovers not only what plagues her but also what cures her-the birth of her sensuality, her creativity as an artist, and storytelling as an act of healing. ... Read more

Reviews (15)

Trust your instincts when you read this book.
Is this a coming of age with epilepsy story?

Or is it a coming of age with Munchausen's story?

Or is it a stunning example of postmodern fiction, which is neither of the above but written simply to mess with our minds?

[I vote for the latter.]

Whether you believe this is fiction or nonfiction, you are certain to have a strong reaction to the protagonist.

I am a certified medical transcriptionist with 18 years of experience in acute care hospital work. Over the years, through both my work and my voracious reading, I have received quite a medical education. When I read Lying for the first time, certain of the medical details struck me as odd. Slater includes an analysis of her epilepsy and its subsequent surgical treatment written by her treating neurologist. In it, the author states that LJS had eliopathic epilepsy. Hmmm, I thought. I've never encountered that term before; I'd better look it up. In another chapter, Slater describes presurgical testing; she explains her doctor will make a small incision in her scalp then stimulate different areas of her brain. That's odd, I thought; it's not quite that simple. Our brains are not enclosed in only our scalps -- there's another layer involved, our hard, bony skulls. Still I read on, on some level distrusting my thoughts.

Yet when I finished the book and understood as much as I could, for there is much information the author does not, will not supply, I didn't feel manipulated.

I felt instead awe. Don't take the chapter about marketing the book at face value. Ignore the author's insistence on categorizing this work as nonfiction. Forget that you found it shelved with the other illness memoirs.

Slater has written the best piece of fiction I've read since I devoured J.K. Rowling's first novel. I hope she writes many more.

stunning
This is, simply, the best memoir available in contemporary American letters. Slater here tells a gripping story of spiritual and moral awakening in beautiful prose. At the same time, this memoir explores the contradictions and possibilities at the heart of this new creative non fiction form, and she does this in a way that is not pretentious or overly "post modern," but that is exacting and exciting. Slater's book in many ways is like Dave Egger's book, A Heartbreaking work Of Staggering Genius in its innovative and oftentimes hilarious and heartbreaking sttructure and theme, but Slater's book is better, because while Eggers plays some neat narrative tricks, they never integrate with the deeper meaning of his work. Lying integrates form and function gorgeously. It will make you laugh, cry, and think. Congratulations, Lauren Slater, on a brilliant book.

A good read for people who like mind games
I could read this book over and over again, and I doubt I'd ever get sick of it. If you like symbolism, you'll love this book. Possibly the entire book (which is a non-fiction autobiography) is written as a metaphor, plus the author admits from the very beginning that she's a liar. In the end, the reader is left wondering which parts of this spectacular book are true and which aren't. Moreover, the author challenges the reader to consider what is truly real and what isn't. A worthwhile read, for sure.

Eye Opening and Mind Teasing!
Wow! This book was incredible. I am taking an autobiography class right now and it was a required reading. This is probably one of the most fascinating books I have ever read. Slater writes this book from an interesting perspective. As I was reading it I thought it was similar to the movie A Beautiful Mind. Like A Beautiful Mind you see her story directly through her eyes and from her perspective. Eventhough the reader is left wodnering what is real in her story, she does a great job of leading the reader through her story/her lie. In the beginning you read her story, beleiving what she says is the truth, but by the end you have no idea what the truth is. Some of my classmates said that they got frustrated with not knowing what the truth was, one literally threw the book across the room when she was reading. I, however, didn't get frustrated with it, but for some twisted reason I just saw it as looking at the world through her eyes. I mean afterall it is her autobiography, just because it isn't a fact doesn't neccessarily mean it isn't how she felt or what she expereinced. She even says this is a metaphorical memior and through it you can see that it wasn't about the events of her life but about her innerself, her emotions, and her perceptions of life. Overall though this book was excellent. It was hard to put it down and it constantly kept my attention. Definately a must read!

Magnificent
I frequently find myself quoting from pages of this book. Anyone who doesn't believe that they can't relate in some way would be, in fact, a liar... to themselves.

Whether torn by the duality of Gemini, or having gone through a crisis that makes you question your belief and being, you must identify with this book.

The descriptive style and constant jumps from reality to perceived psychosis will keep you turning pages. I can't wait to read more of her work. ... Read more

Book Description

"This is a wonderful book. It gives a warm and loving picture of an isolated African country regularly castigated in the US press. It reiterates eloquently lessons lost by our medical establishment and our populace, which need to be regained." --Journal of the American Medical Association

An unforgettable tale of medicine at the crossroads of two cultures

After four years of psychiatric residency and two years of practice as an attending psychiatrist in San Francisco­­which included stints in an emergency room and the city jail­­Paul Linde thought he'd seen it all. When his pediatrician wife decided that she wanted to work as a doctor in Africa, he went along for the ride, greeting the prospect with a blasé "same job, different continent," attitude. What he found, instead, would challenge much of what he thought he knew about mental illness and transform him as a physician and as a human being.

Of Spirits and Madness is Dr. Linde's account of his year spent practicing psychiatry in Zimbabwe's Harare Central Hospital. In a compelling narrative brimming with compassion, insight, and no small measure of good humor, he tells of his shock at the magnitude of human suffering that greeted him on his arrival in Africa and his initial bafflement with its people's superstitions and differing worldview. He introduces us to his patients, vividly relating how his experiences with them awakened him to the ways in which mental illness cuts across cultures, ultimately filling him with a deep admiration for the incredible patience and spiritual dignity with which they endured their poverty and illnesses. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Must Read
I have worked in Zimbabwe for two years as a photographer and film maker. Of Spirits and Madness gives western thinking a new vantage point. Remember, there is no reality only perception. One of the best books I have read on Shona culture. The spiritual basis of life forms all other truths in Africa. Great Book, wonderful to read.

Outstanding
I bought this book to be polite. When a friend of 10+ years writes a book... you buy it. And the day before his reading... you start the first chapter. What I did not expect was that I would absolutely inhale the text. My brain lit up with pleasure. There are so many good things about this book. Not only is the writing itself excellent, the information that Paul tucks into the narratives of each patient is downright fascinating. He takes up politics, economics, spirituality, culture, context, and mental health. The story of each patient's illness is refracted through Paul's Western training, his good heart, and his growing understanding of the local explanations for why things happen as they do. Along the way he provides a terrific set of curbside lectures about a wide spectrum of mental illnesses. He interweaves factual information about disease states with tender compassion for and curiosity about the people he served. I learned a lot from this book and plan to read it again. Maybe I should be polite more often....

Ancestor Bewichment Clashes with Modern Medicine.
Dr. Paul Linde's book "Of Spirits and Madness" is a wonderfully entertaining and insightful look into the culture and psyche of the Zimbabwean people. As an American psychiatrist in this third world African country, he becomes immersed in a cultural quagmire of ancestral spirits, evangelical Christianity and traditional healers all colliding with modern Western medical practices. The results, a train wreck of frequently amusing and sometimes very sad situations: experienes which challenged the author's intellectual and medical skills while raising questions in his own mind about the modern world's pursuit of indivudual gain and blatant consumption. This is a great book which will make all readers laugh, think and reevaluate one's own views of what is truly important. The best book I've read this year!

An excellent and inspiring book
In the spirit of the preeminent novelist/psychiatrist Irvin Yalom, Dr. Paul Linde has written a touching and inspiring book about his experiences as a psychiatrist working in Zimbabwe under very difficult circumstances. Despite the "depressing' subject matter (mental illness, poverty, political strife, AIDS, sexism. etc.), Linde has written a surprisingly uplifting account of the human condition. Using well-crafted prose, the reader learns many interesting things about the state of mental health in this Africa nation with its relatively advanced mental health system. Compared to other "third world" nations, Zimbabwe's treatment of the seriously mentally ill is good, but it is still a far cry from that of most Western nations. Linde is an excellent storyteller, telling the stories of his patients with poignancy, humor and deep compassion. All mental health professionals, both the experienced clinician and the neophyte should read this book. This book would also of interest to those interested in African current events. The reader will find himself deeply concerned for the plight of Dr. Linde's patients.

Taking on the Spiritual Challenge to Madness
There's never a dull moment in this psychiatrist's travelogue on a mad journey with his patients. During his year as a government psychiatrist in Zimbabwe, Dr. Paul Linde has to adjust to the cultural challenges that have his patients as likely to consult a witch doctor and herbal treatments as modern medicine.
Packaged in a series of literary narratives, the eleven character studies--one per chapter--personify the cultural and medical challenges he faces, from a young man convinced he's suffering to spare his community to the delinquent employee who claims she needs to rest her mind.
Linde approaches his new assignment with an open mind and writes with sensitivity. He invites the reader along in an exploration of the African supernatural and psychological landscape. This is stuff Karen Blixen didn't see in the Kenyan hills; it's more the twisted psyche Conrad explores at the heart of the Congo.
Of Spirits and Madness is a worthwhile read for anyone interested in the human condition. ... Read more

Book Description

Available here for the first time in English, this eyewitness account by one of Freud’s earliest students has been rediscovered for twenty-first century readers. Isidor Sadger’s recollections provide a unique window into the early days of the psychoanalytic movement—the internecine and ideological conflicts of Freud’s disciples. They also illuminate Freud’s own struggles: his delight in wit, his attitudes toward Judaism, and his strong opinions concerning lay, non-medical analysts.

As a student, Sadger attended Freud’s lectures from 1895 through 1904. Two years later Freud nominated Sadger to his Wednesday Psychological Society (later called the Viennese Psychoanalytic Society).Sadger, however, was not part of Freud’s inner circle, but more a participant observer of the early years of the psychoanalytic movement and of Freud as teacher, therapist, and clinician.

Sadger was considered one of the most devoted followers of Freud and hoped to become one of Freud’s "favorite sons."At the First Psychoanalytic Congress held in Salzburg in 1908, Sadger was chosen to be one of the principal speakers along with Freud, Jones, Adler, Jung, Prince, Riklin, Abraham, and Stekel, an honor that bespeaks Sadger’s early role in the movement.But Freud and many of his disciples were also openly critical of Sadger’s work, calling it at various times overly simplistic, unimaginative, reductionist, orthodox, and rigid.

In 1930 Sadger published his memoir, Sigmund Freud: Persönliche Erinnerungen.With the rise of Nazism and World War II, the book became lost to the world of psychoanalytic history.Recently, Alan Dundes learned of its existence and mounted a search that led him around the world to one of the few extant copies—in a research library in Japan. The result of his fascinating quest is Recollecting Freud, a long-lost personal account that provides invaluable insights into Freud and his social, cultural, and intellectual context. ... Read more

Book Description

Virtually unknown today, Alfred Russel Wallace was the co-discoverer of natural selection with Charles Darwin and an eminent scientist who stood out among his Victorian peers as a man of formidable mind and equally outsized personality. Now Michael Shermer rescues Wallace from the shadow of Darwin in this landmark biography. Here we see Wallace as perhaps the greatest naturalist of his age--spending years in remote jungles, collecting astounding quantities of specimens, writing thoughtfully and with bemused detachment at his reception in places where no white man had ever gone. Here, too, is his supple and forceful intelligence at work, grappling with such arcane problems as the bright coloration of caterpillars, or shaping his 1858 paper on natural selection that prompted Darwin to publish (with Wallace) the first paper outlining the theory of evolution. Shermer also shows that Wallace's self-trained intellect, while powerful, also embraced surprisingly naive ideas, such as his deep interest in the study of spiritual manifestations and seances. Shermer shows that the same iconoclastic outlook that led him to overturn scientific orthodoxy as he worked in relative isolation also led him to embrace irrational beliefs, and thus tarnish his reputation.As author of Why People Believe Weird Things and founding publisher of Skeptic magazine, Shermer is an authority on why people embrace the irrational. Now he turns his keen judgment and incisive analysis to Wallace's life and his contradictory beliefs, restoring a leading figure in the rise of modern science to his rightful place. ... Read more

Reviews (8)

Darwin forever under a cloud....
After reading a review in NY review of books of Shermer's book I snapped out of my previous opinion and decided to revise my previous review here. Distracted by the issues raised in A. Brackman's book, A Delicate Arrangement, 'rebutted' by Shermer, I wavered wrongly in my original view at what appears now as a clever whitewash of Darwin.
Putting Brackman's arguments to one side for the nonce, the plain fact of the matter is that Darwin was, and has been ever since, engineered by Big Science propaganda into the exclusive icon for the discovery of evolution. And is Shermer just the fellow for this displacement job on Wallace. Wallace confuses people because they think that Darwin on the descent of man is established science, when the reality is that an immense con job has always finessed the fact that science has no conclusive theory here, and Wallace honestly pointed it out. Period.
As to the rest of Shermer's arguments in his book, viz. on the 'science' of history, they are without merit and constitute another of the 'bilge and balderdash' necessary to cover up the fact that there is no science of history, also.
The whole Darwin field is addicted to a pack of lies and it seems all parties have lost the ability to distinguish truth from distortion. Reviewing the details of the Ternate affair, we seem to see the ambitious Darwin concerned to rescue his priority, after years of so doubting his theory he couldn't publish it, and getting his priority by rigging the priority list and rushing into print. We have spent over a century beholden to this farce. Time for a little skepticism.

In the shadow no longer
Alfred Russel Wallace seems to rate hardly more than a footnote in the history of the theory of evolution. Like most who have studied this subject, I knew of Wallace's mutual discovery of the theory and evidence in support of it. I knew too of Darwin's generous introduction of the man as a co-discoverer, and even of the theory that that introduction might have been more premeditated and less generous that it appears. In some of my reading I had even learned of Wallace's "defection" to spiritualism. However, where Darwin's life is everywhere paraphrased and his thoughts on the subject of evolution almost subject to canonization, Wallace's life and thoughts seemed just to have "fallen out" of the picture. Michael Shermer's book, In Darwin's Shadow, The Life and Science of Alfred Russel Wallace, provides a more detailed look at Wallace the man and scientist. It also looks at the subject of how history and biography reflects the psychology of their time-in some ways, he does so unintentionally.

In many ways A. R. Wallace, though not a formally educated man, was more of a research scientist than Darwin. He apparently plunged into the pursuit of regional studies with a vengeance for most of his youth, some twelve years abroad, studying natural subjects in their native habitat. Whether it was beetles in the tropics, indigenous people in their native and in their European dominated settings, the communities of animals characteristic of different regions in Southeast Asia, or the geology of various regions, etc, his studies were extensive and detailed. According to Shermer, he logged in over 20,000 miles on various collecting trips, and just on his Malay trip collected almost 125,000 specimens, over a thousand of which were new species (p. 14).

His reputation for openness and exposure to new experiences was amazing, especially for the day, and recognized even by those who did not necessarily agree with his opinions. His written output was prolific and varied, with topics ranging from ancient history, animal behavior, botany, ethics, history of science, linguistics, plurality of worlds, phrenology, spirtualism, taxonomy, womens rights, agricultural economics, literature and poetry, poor laws, and trade regulation (p. 15). Shermer indicates that even into old age Wallace wrote on a variety of subjects and had a life-time average output that ranks high, even when compared to modern writers like Gould, Sagan, and Ernst Mayr.

While I found Shermer's historical matrix model interesting, I felt that I learned more about how history and biography are created in our own time and what it says about us than I did about Wallace or his contemporaries. The matrix model seems to smack of psychobabble and Oprah "awarenesses" and introduces a lot of introspection into the possible effects of birth order, etc. on behavior. It tries to hard to get at the "whys?" of human behavior and motivation for which there is little proof for or against. It was only once the author got into the life and times of the man himself that I could more easily settle into Wallace's world. For one thing, I understood better what the flap about the man's delving into spiritualism was all about. I also learned where Wallace and Darwin differed, even from the beginning, in their own individual approach to evolution, and why Darwinian evolution is the model that gained the greatest respect and serves as the foundation of modern theories.

I think more than anything, the book introduces the reader to the fact that science is a communal thing, a human thing, and is subject to the vicissitudes of other human endeavors: chance, political and social prejudices, personalities and egos, readiness for new ideas, plain old mistakes, etc. I learned again that scientific discoveries occur in tandem, when the world is ready to receive them, that they're sort of "in the air." I learned that more than one person can come up with the same or similar idea, putting their own personal stamp on the concept, thereby forwarding human knowledge just a little bit more. I learned that scientists can be wrong or partly wrong about their topic and can be wrong or partly wrong about topics outside their expertise, and most importantly, that reputation should not be given total credence without proper thought. Because a person is famous does not mean that their opinions are any more valid than anyone else's.

An enlightening biography of an interesting man. While I think that Darwin's is the more carefully thought out and supported theory of evolution, I think that Wallace was the more interesting and happier person. I suspect it would have been more fun to have known him than to have known Darwin.

Interesting biography
A nice story of the scientist who came to a similar conclusion about natural history as his elder and more famous colleague, Darwin. I enjoyed reading about Wallace's background (quite different than Darwin's), his world travels, and the ways in which his theories differed from Darwin's. The author uses multivariate analysis on personality traits to attempt to explain some of these differences; I'm not fully convinced of the validity of that (for every statistical rule there are exceptions, and as Mark Twain colorfully observed, "there are lies ..."), but it's an interesting possibility.

The new phrenologists?
I bought this book rather in spite of than because of the other Amazon reviews, and lugged it with me on a flight out to the West Coast. The book lasted from Boston to Atlanta, and when it was over I closed it with a sigh of relief. While Shermer is certainly at times an engaging writer here he indulges in a rather peculiar form of quantitative psycho-history mixed in with the equally peculiar allocation of behavioural traits to birth order. There MAY be something in this somewhere, but at the same time it smacks of the 19th century Victorian fetish about cranial measurments that Shermer's evident hero-mentor Stephen Gould took to task in THE MISMEASURE OF MAN. That Shermer is so obsessed with his methodologies (he devotes a substantial portion of the book to 'how he did it") is a shame because it lessens and weakens his focus on his putative topic, the fascinating Alfred Wallace. Instead of really delving intoWallace's background and early experiences we get a few pages of quick gloss intertwined with what frankly struck me as mumbo-jumbo about what it means to be a Younger Child. This may be all very new Age & Hip right now, but I strongly doubt it will prove to have much in the way of scholarly legs. Then there is the tedious re-hashing of Gould's speculations which other reviewers have already re-hashed. Yup, they are old, they are trite, and can we please now move on? Perhaps the most interesting part of the book is the discussion of Wallace's involvement with various "Spiritualist" frauds during the second half of his career. Here the writing really picks up & one has the sense that "aha, now we are going to get somewhere". Alas, the excitement soon fades & the book itself fades out to a gentle glow at the end. i really don't know how to categorize this text. It is far too incomplete for someone unfamiliar with Wallace's life & work to get a real sense of the man and it offers such an odd view on Wallace's relationships with friends, family, colleagues & rivals that one is left wondering just what was intended. A footnote to a more general study? Maybe, but i agree with the reviewer who calls for the need of a REAL biography that puts Wallace AND his science in proper context.

Cursing the darkness
Restoring Albert Russell Wallace's reputation is an occasional occupation with historians. Some wish to elevate him over Darwin, usually on the question of "priority" - who first thought up evolution by natural selection? Others portray him as the victim of Britain's class structure - doomed to obscurity because of his humble background. Shermer, although the title implies otherwise, makes an attempt to reconcile Darwin and Wallace, at least over natural selection. From that point, Shermer follows Wallace through a complex life. This readable, if somewhat shallow, biography does Wallace justice, but at the cost of shedding the broader context. In support of his programme, he relies heavily on Frank Sulloway's research on "birth-order" and creativity. This innovative study has had a rocky career, but Shermer finds it useful. For him, the findings have meaning, but their validity remains unclear. Especially when comparing but two subjects.

Wallace was a complicated personality, perhaps even more so than Darwin himself. In order to build a coherent image of his subject, Shermer creates a "historical matrix model". This is a three-dimensional visual aid of the elements he's utilising in erecting Wallace's biography. Mixing time, Wallace's various excursions and interests, Shermer ties the whole structure to his subject's views on evolution of humanity and the mind. Whether this method works may depend on your attitude about applying mathematical structures to a man's life. Fortunately for readability, Shermer keeps the application of this device at a low key, saving his analytical summation to the end of the book - where it falls flat.

Shermer traces the voyages Wallace was virtually forced to undertake. Financial woes dogged the naturalist throughout his life, although it's hard to see that from Shermer's portrayal. Although Shermer puts Wallace "in Darwin's shadow" he was easily as fluent a correspondent as his more famous counterpart. Yet few of the cited letters contain appeals for employment. Instead, Shermer takes us through Wallace's views on social questions, spiritualism and variations on natural selection. He also shows how Wallace traveled and dealt with a broad spectrum of issues and the people associated with them. Darwin, of course, maintained almost a hermit's life at Down. It's strange that Shermer makes little note of the contrast of the two since much of Darwin's information leading to natural selection came from a global correspondence. Wallace, ever the field researcher, relied more on his own collections for evidence.

Although providing us with a highly readable biography of the man, Shermer is virtually silent on the general social scene of Victorian Britain. In pursuing his subject's life, we are given quirky events and some questionable people. There's an excuse for avoiding the tumultuous politics of the era, but Shermer follows Wallace in his admiration for socialist Robert Owen and the role of Mechanics' Institutes to educate the workers. Both schemes were designed to generate worker contentment at minimal cost - Britain retained a horror of worker rebellion after the Napoleonic era. No mention is made of the Luddite or Chartist movements, which should have elicited comments from socialist Wallace.

A more bizarre oversight is Shermer's failure to impart Wallace's feeling on some of natural selection's sharper criticisms. One in particular, Lord Kelvin's assessment that the age of the solar system was too short to allow the needed time frame for evolution. Fleeming Jenkin's point that changes in organisms would be blended back, a point that Darwin, ignorant of Mendelian genetics, agonised over, is also overlooked by Shermer. Since any biography of Darwin will deal with these issues at length, it's only logical that Shermer should have addressed them. Either that or Wallace ignored them - we remain in the dark either way.

Shermer's sins of omission may be forgiven as retaining clarity and brevity. His committed sins, however, cannot be condoned. His long career as an acolyte of the Pope of Paleontology leads Shermer to peck at Darwin's image. The worst examples are intrusions of "punctuated speciation" in a variety of disguises. Shermer's attempt to promote his mentor's outdated thesis borders on the pathetic. He aggravates it later in the book with other Gouldian pronouncements. Gould makes the index six times, with "punk eek" scoring another ten. In a biography of Wallace, this ploy is simply an outrageous non sequitor. He puts Wallace in "Darwin's dark shadow" [what other kind is there?], implying some sinister agenda. Wallace is "eclipsed" by Darwin - as if Darwin so intended. Darwin's opposition to spiritualism is a "secret war". The position is misleading. The shadow is cast by the long-lived eminence of Darwin's contributions, but Shermer makes no mention of that. It's history's verdict, not Darwin's.

Shermer's use of Sulloway is bewildering. Parallels between Darwin and Wallace are inevitable, but the author's are flimsy. "Birth order" as an issue with these two men is misleading. If he wanted to compare the two as personalities, why does Shermer ignore the similarity of Wallace's losing his first love, Marion Leslie and Darwin's loss of Fanny Owen? That Wallace delved into a wider list of topics than Darwin keeps the former's public life more interesting, but doesn't move the latter into a "shadow." Wallace wasn't dogged by illness throughout his life - his long life certainly suggests good health. He shed whatever Christianity he had at an early age, while Darwin was driven to abandon it from his studies and the loss of children. Shermer doesn't need to shatter Darwin's image to restore Wallace's, but that intent is broadcast in his title. It was a mistake. If Shermer is intent on restoring Wallace's reputation, he should have hired somebody to do it for him. Janet Browne would be a good first choice. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada] ... Read more

Book Description

A moving and beautifully written memoir in which the author turns the exploratory lens of a brilliant psychoanalytic mind on the dark corners of his own life. Allen Wheelis has helped many patients understand themselves and cope with the legacies of trauma or obsession that shape the neurotic personality. Here he uses his own life as the uncharted territory for this same process of discovery. The story begins with his parents' courtship and a life of extreme poverty in rural Texas. When Wheelis is a small boy, his father contracts tuberculosis. He will spend several years bedridden and dying, exercising to the last a tyrannical control over his family. In one searing scene, Wheelis is punished by being made to cut the grass in the yard with a razor, a task that will occupy every day of his summer. Timidity, insecurity, and a cloyingly close connection to his mother mark Wheelis's efforts to establish himself in the adult world. In the course of trying to write a novel as a young man, Wheelis falls mysteriously ill. Eventually he realizes that he has made himself ill so that his failure to write can be excused. It is this perception that leads him to the study of medicine, and eventually psychiatry. Through his eyes, we come to understand how a gift for analysis--like a gift for prophecy--brings little comfort to its possessor, and no guarantee of happiness. ... Read more

Reviews (7)

Can women empathize with this?
It can be embarassing sometimes for a reader to hear about sexual desire-- particularly when it reveals so well that forbidden place men seem to know. Somehow, Wheelis avoids going overboard. At one point, he admits to the reader that if we like him, he has failed to truly reveal himself. Perhaps the reason I like him is that I am thankful. Usually male sexual desire is loaded-- we (as men) are either taught to embrace it (machismo) or chastise it. In this case I it was simply felt and explained.

A book that changed my life
I am editor of the professional journal "Psychotherapy In Australia" and also a therapist. So I've read many many books on, by, and for therapy and therapists. Allen Wheelis' "The Listener" is utterly distinctive and forced me to confront myself about just how honest I have been with myself in my own life. It is also beautifully written. I've read this book three times now, ans gained more each time, and I've set off on a quest to read all his other books. Irvin Yalom has reviewed this book by asking if a more honest autobiography has ever been written. I have no fear in answering "No".

Heart-wrenching
I've read many, many self-help books in my pursuit to resolve issues such as controlling food intake, poor social skills, negative self-image, and just simply how to manage what happens externally, so that I'm internally balanced. Then I read Wheelis's "How People Change". POW. What a great impact on me. And in that small book, I got a good glimpse into his life. I absolutely had to know more about him. But while reading Listener, I had to keep reminding myself that is not a self-help book. What I was thinking while reading, was how interesting it was to hear about his emotional challenges, the whole range of dilemma's he lived through. This book supplies a lot of very valuable lessons on how *not* to live life, in contrast to his People Change book. 1.) I will make absolutely sure I am emotionally available to my wife when I do find her and get married. LIke Wheelis, I've been over-analytical, but moreso than Wheelis, been very lonely,( full of meaningless short relationships where sex was pretty much it) 2.) Concerning his agony over not being able to sow his wild oates, not getting enough sex as a young man, this is something I used to dwell on. My attitude, as a Christian I've recently become, is, everytime I feel that heart-in-the-pit-of-my-stomach feeling when I see a beautiful woman with wonder what I'm missing out or how I'm suffering, this life as a human being is short and I'm running out of time to give as much as possible, not lust as much as possible. The lust you experience with one spouse is enough! No other sex is necessary. I wish that Wheelis could have replaced his thoughts of deprivation, during his life, with these sort of thoughts. I am not saying to be a Christian or even religious, but take *some* kind of spirtual approach and realize that a part of you never dies and just because you didn't experience as much sex as you wanted, doesn't mean you've officially blown a "chance". You are eternal, and there are joys ahead after this little margin of human existence, I'm convinced (yeah i guess I *am* asking you to a little religious), that make human lust very minor in comparison. I really felt for him and the pain he described. In an especially sexually-explicit segment of about two pages, he speaks for all men, in terms of our unfortunate hard-wiredness to want sex so bad and under any condition that we want. More than anything, this book will drive you right back to his How People Change book to re-read it and absorb it. ( If your inspirational book of choice is something else, then go re-read that again. I recommend the road less traveled)

Has a more honest autobiography ever been written?
Allen Wheelis who has written a series of extraordinary novels and professional psychiatric books, offers a moving, beautiful, and powerfully evocative memoir. Psychoanalysts, he says, know too much to hide behind self-decption and this astonishing book reveals the shape of a life seen straight, seen without distorting lenses.

Poor Allen...his father needed a psychoanalyst!
Throughout the whole book I felt nothing but pain for this poor little boy; abused by his father, who grew into the adult victim of his elderly mother---a mother whose repressed sexual desires (due to her husbands illness) were directed toward her son. I cried for Allen the boy and Allen the man. ... Read more

Book Description

A brilliant and fascinating biography of the most important psychoanalyst since Freud and Jung.

This beautifully written and long-awaited biography is the first full-scale life of the great British psychoanalyst, a major figure both in psychiatry and as a principle influence on the leading child development experts of our time, including Brazelton, Spock, and Stanley Greenspan.

A pediatrician turned analyst, D. W. Winnicott rose to prominence in the stormy days when the followers of Anna Freud were battling those of Melanie Klein for the right to be called Freud's true intellectual heirs. This rich, witty, and insightful story probes the autobiographical sources of Winnicott's influential concepts, such as the "holding environment" so crucial to psychotherapy and the "transitional object" known to every parent as the "security blanket." Winnicott's astonishing career involves many of the great figures in psychoanalysis and psychology, not just Klein and Anna Freud but the whole eccentric Bloomsbury scene including the Stracheys, R. D. Laing, and the controversial Pakistani prince and analyst Masud Khan.

Readers of Oliver Sacks, Janet Malcolm, and Peter Gay, as well as anyone interested in the great explorers of human nature, will find this book passionately absorbing. ... Read more

Book Description

A son's coming to terms with his mother's decision to abandon her career as a concert pianist in order to raise her children. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

Beautiful Book
This is a story about a fascinating woman, the writer's mother Gitta Gradova, a brilliant pianist who--after all kinds of pressures and for all kinds of reasons--stopped performing publicly in order to raise her family. Her son has brought her back to life on the pages of this book along with her dozens of brilliant celebrated friends and colleagues. That's not the half of it, though.
This writer, an experienced and articulate student of human nature whose background in psychology has--somehow--not dulled his personal honesty, takes the oppurtunity to explore the landscape of children and parents as children grow up, the motives of artists in general and of his mother in particular, the conflict all talented women face as their children are born, and the nature of performance of all kinds. Cottle's tangential discussions of the nature of art--rich with thought and examples--are more complete, provocative and loving than many books devoted to the subject.
This is a book about art and a book about family showing the balance between the two that all artists most somehow find. It's a book about women and their sons, about the sacrifices and frictions of life here on earth, and ultimately about all of us. ... Read more

Book Description

There is no better way to get students interested and excited about the origins of psychology than to let them read actual letters written by the people who founded the discipline. Ludy Benjamin, one of the leading historians of psychology in the United States, has collected the private ideas of these individuals in order to provide your students with a unique vantage point from which to explore the foundations upon which this exciting discipline was built. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Emotions will run the gamut from anger and sadness to joy
Michele McBride is an inspiration for all of us.Never again will I complain of little aches and pains, after reading what this woman endured for more than forty years after the tragic fire.I had no idea that being burned affects your muscles and joints making them practically unbendable, and also interferes with your circulation.Michele rose above the ashes of this tragedy and can teach us all how to cope with disaster.The most horrible part of the story is how the community in which it took place basically fell apart after the fire.Children, adults and clergy alike were encouraged NOT to talk about the fire at OLA, when talking and expressing grief would probably have been the best therapy for the survivors.I lived in that neighborhood and many people said that the neighborhood "changed" because of a shady real estate practice called blockbusting.I think the neighborhood changed because the heart went out of it when all those children died- the people couldn't cope and moved away.

...

Snatched From the Jaws of Death
Michelle McBride saved her life by jumping out the classroom window just as the flames were about to claim their final victims. Her body began burning just as she jumped. A second later and she would have been overcome and helpless, and sure to be the 96th victim of that horrific fire. She discusses the ordeal she faced, year after year after year. Perhaps the most surprising fact she relates was the thoughtless remarks of people.

Lost Childhood
While this book is not as professionally written as "To Sleep With the Angels," Michele McBride describes the deep psychological effect the fire had on her and other survivors.Until reading these two books on the Our Lady of the Angels School fire, I did not realize how badly burned many of the surviving students had been.Severe burns affect the body throughout adulthood.Michele McBride died in July 2001 due to multiple organ breakdown, which perhaps was an offshoot of her injuries in 1958.

A heart wrenching true story of a school fire and victims.
This book was read a number of years back while I was a student at the National Fire Academy in Maryland. As a 20+ year veteran member of the fire service and having experienced two parochial school fires myself as a childI couldn't put the book down. It's a moving personal account of a long termvictim of this tradgedy in which 95 students and teachers perished. Many ofthe survivors faced a complete traumatic change in their lives. A newerbook on this school fire tradgedy was published in 1996 (To Sleep With TheAngels) and it refers to Michelle as one of the most seriuosly injuredstudents. I'm looking for a copy of Michelle's book for my collection. Iwould like to refer both of these books to some movie producers. This yearwas the 40th annivesary of this tragic event. Professionally speaking, afire like this could still happen again in our country....

The biggesttradgedy was after the fire and the lack of compassionate psyhcologicalhelp for the survivors and the families that lost their children so closeto Christmas..... and for every Christmas thereafter.

Understanding of Michele's fight to live as a burn victim.
Michele describes the horror, fear, anger, depression, and finally her recovery from the severe physical and psychological problems she suffered as a burn victim from the time of the Our Lady of the Angels School fire on December 1, 1958, until her adulthood.I was searching for some answers on the fire since I was a student at the school also (emotionally injured only).I guess I was searching for something she might say in the hopes that I could find out what happened to my girlfriend across the street as well as to some of my other friends who perished in the fire.I now can say I can't imagine having been burnt and going through all that she went through and is probably still going through.I only hope that Michele is successful in establishing the Phoenix Program for post-burn victims.In the writing of this book, I would imagine that Michele had to find it very difficult to go back to all that had happened to her in the 20 years up to the writing of this book! .God Bless Michele and all of the other burn victims of the fire. ... Read more

Book Description

This new biography of Carl Jung, the groundbreaking psychologist who introduced the world to the concepts of individuation, archetypes, and the collective unconscious, is less an outward chronicle of the events in his life than it is a look into the mind and heart of a 20th-century genius. Chronicling Jung's life from a childhood filled with terrifying visions to his early adulthood in which he pursued outer, material goals and, finally, to his midlife return to the realm of inner transformation, this book portrays Jung's down-to-earth, human side, with all the strengths and frailties that accompany the human condition. What emerges is a cohesive portrait of a healer whose skills arose from having first attended to the wounds in his own soul. ... Read more

Reviews (3)

A lovely life, beautifully pictured
This is a beautiful book. I expected that, but there isn't an index, so it is difficult for me to see at a glance what else I might learn from this book. The notes are extremely brief, mainly to give page numbers in MEMORIES, DREAMS, REFLECTIONS by C. G. Jung much more than any of his other works, or to give page numbers in the two volumes of his letters, plus THE FREUD/JUNG LETTERS, and the compilation published by The Analytical Psychology Club of San Francisco, Inc. in 1982, C. G. JUNG, EMMA JUNG, TONI WOLFF. In the contents at the beginning, we find that in Part 1, Wounded, there are two pages for "Toni," and in Part 2, Healer, pages 101-05 for "Helpers: Emma, Toni," and in Part 3, Of the Soul, pages 141-47 for "Answer to Job" and pages 169-172 for "Toni," who died suddenly in her sleep at the age of 65. The caption of the picture on page 170 states, "Although Jung tried to get Toni Wolff's scientific writings published after her death in 1953, as yet they remain unpublished." But sometimes things change faster than photo captions, and Jung managed to write an introduction "When Toni's STUDIES IN JUNGIAN PSYCHOLOGY was published." (p. 171). Jung destroyed "Toni's letters to him and his to her."

Shortly before Walter Kaufmann died in September, 1980, he finished work on the third volume of DISCOVERING THE MIND, which he called FREUD VERSUS ADLER AND JUNG. As a philosophy professor, Kaufmann sought sound scholarship, innovative science, a well-organized writing style, and the sort of penetrating self-knowledge that he was used to from all the work he did on Nietzsche. The first page of section 70 of his book, page 397, explains how Jung achieved success without being particularly profound, by failing in ways that enhanced his popularity, a strategy that ultimately might be considered more professional than scientists can claim to be. He quotes Jung as someone who, "much more even than Adler, became a guru" to a group that expects professionalism above all: "About a third of my cases are not suffering from any clinically definable neurosis, but from the senselessness and aimlessness of their lives. . . . Over two thirds of my patients are in the second half of life."

As a mere philosophy professor, Kaufmann never benefited from having a consistent publisher for his own work, though coming out in paperback made it possible for his translations of Nietzsche to be fully successful. Most of his page 397 is about books. "Among Jung's patients were wealthy American women, eager to do something for the cause. Eventually, the publication of his collected works, in English and German, was subsidized, and the volumes were produced very beautifully and underpriced, and then also made available in extremely attractive paperbacks." Though CARL JUNG: WOUNDED HEALER OF THE SOUL/ AN ILLUSTRATED BIOGRAPHY by Claire Dunne (who was born in Ireland, lived in Australia, and founded two Australian multicultural radio stations) is not entirely the work of women, it is as attractive as any that could describe itself as "--the book is itself a work of art, the kind of enduring tome which is picked up again and again for the pleasure of the eyes as well as that of the mind." (back cover, Olivier Bernier, "who directs the Van Waveren Foundation, was the first to acknowledge the manuscript with a publication development grant." Acknowledgments, p. 218).

The picture on page 104 which shows Freud and C. G. Jung standing, with Emma Jung and Toni Wolff seated in front of them at the Third International Psychoanalytic Congress, 1911, also shows an arm of Lou Andreas-Salome at the edge of the picture by Freud, as more of the same picture is displayed on page 136 in JUNG A BIOGRAPHY by Gerhard Wehr, translated from the German by David M. Weeks. The latter, hefty biography of Jung, for whom "the superindividual was paramount" (Wehr, p. 4) has an index of names on pages 539-549, with the number of listings for Toni Wolff taking 2 lines as only a few names, like Alfred Adler, Jesus Christ, and Friedrich Nietzsche do. Sigmund Freud and Aniela Jaffe each need 3 lines in the index of Wehr's book, which seems to devote much more to Jung's work than to his life. People who are more interested in what kept Jung motivated should see the picture of Toni Wolff on page 50 of Claire Dunne's book, dated December 1930. I'll bet she was about 44 years old then, when Jung was 55, and thought she was only 42. Some people aren't good with numbers, at that age, but people who are likely to buy this book don't have to be adept at math.

A penetrating examination of the man and his ideas
This wonderfully illustrated, spiritual biography of one of psychology's most original thinkers will be welcomed with enthusiasm by Jungian scholars and students. This penetrating examination of the man and his ideas which helped revolutionize psychology and our understanding of the mind is multidimensional and highly recommended.

A Work of Art
With 150 color and B&W illustrations, including some never before seen paintings from Jung's "Red Book," this biography is extremely reader-friendly and gorgeous. It's written in succinct chapters, and the artwork is stuff I'd like to frame. It's available in hardcover and softcover. Jung LIVES in this book as a human being struggling to become who he is meant to be at the deepest level...just like us. ... Read more

Book Description

In the acclaimed sequel to Nobody Nowhere--in which Donna Williams gives readers a guided tour of life with autism--Williams explores the four years since her diagnosis and her attempts to leave her "world under glass" and live normally. NPR sponsorship. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

The sequel I was waiting for...
The first book was an amazing journey for me, and to read the second book was just as wonderful as the first. It left me wondering if there was a third book. A must read!

There is always more to know.
Have you read her first book? You'll be happy to read this one too, and share her experience. Learn more about autism, conquering it, and dealing with it.

Should be A prescribed Text ............
Donna Williams book 'Somebody Somewhere' is one of those books that opens your mind - and makes you want to stand up and applaud human courage. My personal interests include psychology, child development, communication, extra sensory perception psychic ability, and Metaphysics. Donna Williams sharing of her 'world' inadvertently embraced all these subjects, and made me highly aware - not of 'differences' but of 'similarities'. Our human need to be understood, to be treated with dignity, and to be accepted in our individuality.

Donna Williams is truly an Expert on the world of Autism, way beyond the usual sets of clinical observations, and range of treatments designed to 'normalise'. We 'normals' do have to rethink the term 'dis-abled'!

Just what I need to know as I am studing Autism..
I am teaching autistic children and Donna Williams has given me so much information and insite. My students are so much better because of her honisty. Thanks Ms. Williams. I understand you did an interview with Connie Chung on 20/20 in 1994. I can not find it and if there is anyway you can help me I would be very greatful. Thanks again. God bless you. ... Read more

Book Description

"What binds us pushes time away," wrote David Oppenheim to his future wife, Amalie Pollak, on March 24, 1905. Oppenheim, classical scholar, collaborator and then critic of Sigmund Freud, and friend and supporter of Alfred Adler, lived through the heights and depths of Vienna's twentieth-century intellectual and cultural history. He perished in obscurity at a Nazi concentration camp in 1943. More than fifty years later, philosopher Peter Singer set out to explore the life of the grandfather he never knew.

Combining touching family biography with thoughtful reflection on both personal and public questions we face today, Pushing Time Away captures critical moments in Europe's transition from Belle Époque to the Great War, to the rise of Fascism, and the coming of World War II.

Reviews (3)

well-crafted tribute
Australian philosopher Peter Singer, now a professor of bioethics at Princeton University, has written a thoughtful, well-researched portrait of his grandfather, David Oppenheim, who perished in the Theresienstadt concentration camp in 1943. "We all know that six million Jews died," writes Singer in the Prologue, "but that is a mind-numbing statistic. I have a chance to portray one of them as an individual."

His grandfather was a classical scholar in Vienna, a teacher of Greek and Latin at a prestigious gymnasium (high school), and an active participant in the city's psychoanalytic circles as a collaborator, then critic of Sigmund Freud, and a friend and supporter of Alfred Adler, the first of Freud's colleagues to defect from his inner circle over basic disagreements about psychoanalytic theory.

Oppenheim's wife, Amalie (a math and physics scholar in her own right) was also sent to Theresienstadt, but she survived, the only one of Singer's four grandparents to do so. She moved to Australia in 1946, the year Singer was born, and lived with his family for nine years until her death in 1955. Singer went on to study philosophy at Oxford and teach at Monash University in Australia, but always in the background there was a cloud of sadness and silence that hung over his family's recent past. (On his mother's side he comes from a long line of rabbis stretching back to the seventeenth century.)

His aunt's master's thesis about her father inspired Singer to learn more about his grandfather and write this book. Hecollected his grandfather's personal papers, letters between his grandparents before their marriage that he retrieved from his aunt's attic, and letters his grandparents wrote to his parents and aunt after they emigrated to Australia in 1938. Singer also travelled to Vienna to see where his grandparents lived and visit the school where his grandfather taught. He searched for additional pertinent information in the Austrian archives, interviewed his grandfather's surviving students, and went to Theresienstadt to see for himself where his grandfather died. Singer believed that reading through his grandfather's vast collection of writings in German, most of them in longhand that was difficult to read, would be "to undo, in some infinitely small but still quite palpable way, a wrong done by the Holocaust."

The final part of the book describes the departure of the children to Australia in 1938 after the Anschluss, the illusory hope that life would somehow go on, the desperate efforts from faraway Melbourne to save the parents from the impeding catastrophe, and finally Theresienstadt. During his research Singer also learned what happened to his paternal grandparents: the Germans transported them to Lodz in Poland (after that they were probably gassed at Chelmno).

Professor Singer's well-crafted tribute to his grandfather and the lost world of Jewish Vienna is a valuable contribution to Holocaust remembrance and mourning.

--Charles Patterson, Ph.D., author of ETERNAL TREBLINKA: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust

The Missing Element
An excellent and important story that needs to be told over and over again.But for those of us who use non-fiction books such as this for research as well, this book lacks a crucial element--an index.I could not recommend this book to someone researching information on the Holocaust because there is no way for someone to retrieve important information without laboriously searching page by page through the book.When will publishers learn what researchers and librarians know, a non-fiction book without an index is not complete?

Compelling and moving memoir
This is a compelling and frequently moving account of the author's grandparents' lives from the turn of the century in Vienna to the middle years of the twentieth century. The grandparents, David and Amalie Oppenheim, had both the good and bad fortune to live through some of the most interesting and tragic times of the last century. As young, educated, middle-class Jews living in Vienna at the beginning of the twentieth century, they experienced the last days of the Hapsburg empire, the intellectual currents of the time and place (including being part of Freud's circle), the first world war, the depression, anti-semitism, Nazism and the Holocaust, as well as the great intellectual achievements of Austro-German culture.

The book is a fascinating account of the period, as well as the curious relationship between David and Amalie, whose homosexual feelings towards others seem to lead them into marriage and children of their own. The final chapters, describing post-Anschluss Vienna, the ghetto conditions in which they were forced to live, and finally Theresienstadt concentration camp are harrowing and moving. As a memoir rather than a history, the book is written well and reads easily; though there are references to other works, it is not in any way dull or academic. The author's frequent comparisons between his grandfather's way of thinking and his own are I feel a little forced, but this is only a minor quibble, especially when the humanity of both the author and the grandparents about whom he is writing is evident. Highly recommended.

One book which Singer refers to frequently is Stefan Zweig's "The World of Yesterday", which I would also highly recommend to anyone interested in the period or subject matter. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

SNAPSHOTS OF A LIFE
Viktor Frankl has presented us with snap shots of the key events in his life. These recollections were never intended for publication but through the encouragement of his publisher this slim volume was made available for readers. Thus begins our journey in looking at the life of the founder of Logotherapy and the author of "Man's Search for Meaning."

Frankl's life is filled with interesting portraits. We learn of his mother's patrician background and the fact that she was descended from a family of prominent rabbis. His father was a struggling student and was director of the government's Ministry of Social Services.

We get to see this inquisitive young man as he is impacted by Freud, Hirschmann, Schilder and Adler as he begins to step int the field of psychoanalysis. Through his philosophical questionings and debates with these giants in the field we find Frankl developing his own methodology. March of 1938 became a turing point for the young man as his country is invaded by the Nazis and he is placed in a concentration camp. From that experience wee see a new personality arising who meets the psychological, emotional and spiritual tensions in his life with utmost grace.We see a man who has the opportunity to leave Austria and avoid the concentration camps but he elects to stay and care for his parents.

Unfortunately this memoir is not a full autobiography of Frankl. You receive sketches of his life and end up wanting more. Read in conjunction with Man's Search for Meaning, the reader can gain further insight on this great personality. I believe this book serves as a supplemental text for the author's Man Search for Meaning." Hopefully a full scale biographical work will come out on Frankl. Until then, this slender volume will whet your appetite to learn more about this great man.

The man behind Logotherapy
"Recollections" is episodic, much like sharing a cup of coffee with a casual acquaintance and trying to divine their life story from those conversations. Dr. Viktor Frankl's "Man's Search for Meaning" is a landmark book for many seekers--including me--and I jumped at the chance to read this so-called autobiography of a giant in the field of diagnosing modern society's malaise. The book is a pleasant read, with Dr. Frankl's humor guiding the narrative. There's not much in the way of how Dr. Frankl coped with returning from concentration camps to find every member of his family--including his young wife--dead. The late Dr. Frankl's narrative is light and episodic, like afternoon conversations instead of Freudian analysis. ... Read more

Book Description

In this powerful, exquisitely crafted book, Kyoko Mori delves into her dual heritage with a rare honesty that is both graceful and stirring. From her unhappy childhood in Japan, weighted by a troubled family and a constricting culture, to the American Midwest, where she found herself free to speak as a strong-minded independent woman, though still an outsider, Mori explores the different codes of silence, deference, and expression that govern Japanese and American women's lives: the ties that bind us to family and the lies that keep us apart; the rituals of mourning that give us the courage to accept death; the images of the body that make sex seem foreign to Japanese women and second nature to Americans. In the sensitive hands of this compelling writer, one woman's life becomes the mirror of two profoundly different societies.
... Read more

Reviews (24)

Beautiful writing, honest feeling, insightful observation
I loved reading Kyoko Mori's Polite Lies, and will read all her books. I greatly admire her lovely writing style and enjoyed spending time with this thoughtful, perceptive, gentle cultural observer. I have a lifelong fascination with Japanese culture, and felt the truth of Mori's experiences (I was an American child in Tokyo in 1952-54.) I'm also interested in gender issues, art, writing, and comparative cultures in general, so I found her to be a delightful companion and guide. I can imagine that she would indeed be a good interpreter of American culture for the Japanese, just as she enlightens Americans about the Japanese. Thank you Ms. Mori--good work!! Keep writing!

Lies, but hardly polite
If I were a non-Japanese reader who knew nothing of Japan's modern culture, I would have been awed by the revelations this book revealed. As I am not such an uninformed reader, I can not be impressed by this novel. As a note, I am also 16, not 12. I forgot my password and used the children't form.

Kyoko Mori, a Japanese turned American woman, explores the cultures of Japan and the United States. I am not an expert on American culture as I have never even visited its mainland. What I can say is that her information on Japan is outdated, biased, and yet seems authoritive. Her information is far from perfect as I know from my own life experiences. Public schools in Japan are not how she portrays them.

She claims to be comparing the two cultures from across the globe so I expected a fair, good-and-bad account of each from a person with such a background. It was more of an oppurtunity for her to put down Japan, a country that she no longer knows anything about, and a country that I love despite my complaints.

What a lie...
This book looked interesting, it really did. But when I started reading it... what a disappointment!
Readers will see that Ms. Mori had a well... traumatic childhood experience, but does she need to bring down Japan explaining that? I'm a Japanese citizen who is currently living in the United States. I can therefore say that about 99% of the culture information in that book is outdated by about 284829439032 million years. Literally.
If Ms. Mori can't put her past behind her, fine. Just don't bring down another country's culture to be what it was in the stone age. You're over 50 years behind, and if you can't see the good of Japanese culture, don't talk about it.
To all non-Japanese people reading this book, please don't believe what it is saying. It's all a bunch of outdated facts. Yes, it's beautifully written, but the meaning behind there is bad. Maybe it was in another one of her books, but she has a lot of bashing on the Japanese public school system too. Something like, "I would never have received leniency for writing in my own answers to multiple choice questions in a Japanese public school." ANTA BAKA KAI? You're not supposed to write your own answers to multiple choice questions! What do you EXPECT!?
In all, this book was bad.

Political Lies
I have a very similar cultural background to the author's. I also came from Japan twenty some years ago as a high school student. I feel a certain amount of empathy toward her because of my bicultural/bilingual background, but I really don't like the way she describes Japanese culture. It's too stereotypical and generalized. If you want to know anything about Japan, I would recommend "Turning Japanese" by David Mura. Although he is the third generation Japanese American, his views on Japan are fairer and contrary to Mori,he is very honest to himself.
(I don't find Mori being honest when she claims she doesn't know how to write in Japanese after going through Japanese educational system for twelve years...which school did she attend in Japan? She lost her credibility just by saying this!)

Well-written but flawed
This book is similar to Alex Kerr's "Dogs and Demons" because you might consider it a revelation upon reading it. It may strike you as absolutely authoritative and the final word on the subject of women in Japan. It's very well-written but flawed. Like Mr. Kerr, it seems Ms. Mori set out to write a deeply pessimistic and profoundly negative book about Japan. Well, she accomplished that goal. The author must have a photographic memory because in the book she is able to reproduce conversations and events from long ago in extraordinary detail. Ms. Mori is also very persuasive, but don't let her do your thinking for you. Find out for yourself what is true and what is false. Japan, like most countries, is too complex to be uniformly condemned or praised. This book is worth reading, but take it with a grain of salt. ... Read more

Reviews (5)

Honest and hopeful
Without flinching from the truth, this book shows that it IS possible to break the circle of abuse: to understand, to love, to forgive, to recover, and to go on loving and nurturing those who are dear. The story of Hoffman's growing up with two terminally ill brothers, a father sometimes unable to control his rage, a mother who copes by shutting out memories, and a sexually abusive coach, is painful but ultimately hopeful.

How telling your story can save a future victim.
This book was easy reading. I read this book in one night. It thankfully left out the details of the child abuse. Though it tends to jump around, and over many years, it is quite clear as to what happened. The author is telling his story, a very brave one to tell. But the importance of this book is really about how TELLING your story, can set others free. Its also about confronting your abuser, and how THAT can set yourself free. Free of secrets. Free of lies. Lies you tell others, and ones you may tell yourself.

A good read...highly recommended
Richard Hoffman is a brilliant writer, and quite a good teacher as well. My friend David says that he finds the book arousing. hehe Way to go Mr. Hoffman. The New York State Summer Young WriterInstitute Rules! Shout out to all of my peeps! AAAmennn

Gives hope where we usually think there is none
In Half the House Mr. Hoffman, like any good writer, is intimately concerned with truth, the minute, daily, specific reality of his experience in the rustbelt of Allentown, PA, in the nineteen fifties in working class America. His style is careful, descriptive, direct, and poetic -- but not personal. Half the House is written, as Mr. Hoffman is also a well-published poet, with detachment, technique, and maturity. Of the several memoirs I have read this year, only Half the House resolves its issues, its grimness, its pain in a health-promoting, realistic, peace-giving redemption. That final, moving scene between defensive father and guilty son, wherein each gives a little, then alot, then communicate genuinely and respectfully dissolving forty years of impediment to love, is the kind of real life forgiveness all of us only dare dream of. Half the House does it. As Nabokov once said it takes a deep spiritual sense to create a masterpiece. Half the House has the depth. Ron Morin

Very private writing
I read "Half the House" because I'm a sucker for anything billed as a memoir of abuse and healing. I had it on my "to read" pile for a year befor an update on ABC's "20/20" compelled me to get it out. (The update was useful -- without it "Half the House" remains half a book -- that's not a slam.)Mr. Hoffman is just a bit younger than I and from the same region and religi