Amazon.com

Colin Turnbull (1924-94) made his reputation with two bestselling works of popular anthropology that tell diametrically opposed tales. The Forest People (1962) holds up the central African Pygmies as examples of the human capacity for communal goodness and love, while The Mountain People (1973) argues that Uganda's Ik tribe, threatened by a killing famine, had cast aside those qualities in favor of soulless individualism. Turnbull's life was as controversial and rife with contradictions as his books, fellow anthropologist Roy Richard Grinker reveals in this absorbing biography. Born in England, Turnbull roamed the world and eventually made his home in America. Product of a conventional, privileged upbringing, he saw himself as a champion for the world's oppressed. He infused anthropology with a passion some deemed unscientific but general readers found electrifying. He was openly homosexual despite the threat this posed to his academic career, which was never his top priority. The love of Turnbull's life was an African American man; he proclaimed Joe Towles's brilliance but was ambivalent about his lover gaining financial independence, and their 29-year relationship was marred by violence and infidelities. Nonetheless, Joe's 1988 death devastated Turnbull, who also succumbed to AIDS six years later. Grinker displays both discernment and critical sympathy in this gripping chronicle of a tumultuous life. ... Read more

Reviews (12)

Anthropology: an affair of the heart
What a fascinating and eye-opening book! I vaguely remember Colin Turnbull from my freshman anthropology class, but Grinker's book brings to life just what motivates people to fall in love with other cultures. As it turns out, it's not so different from love affairs in general -- and just as heartbreaking -- and this is the lesson gleaned from this chronicle of one extraordinarily brave British anthropologist. While I did learn alot about African traditions, this book reads like a novel, not an academic treatise. Grinker is a fluent and imaginative writer whose prose swept me along from the very first page. I suggest this book for people who enjoy reading psychologically astute biographies as well as gripping love stories -- it's probably the most affecting biography of the season.

Terrific Biography About Turnbull
This is a terrific biography about a fascinating 20th century mind: Colin Turnbull. What a life Turnbull had from academia to ashrams, Africian culture to the African queen, homoerotic british school boys to the emergence of the gay bar scene in 1960's New York, the devastation of WW II to the devastation of HIV, and above all a profound love story. Richard Grinker does a marvelous job of recreating the personal life of one of the centuries great intellects. This is a fascinating work on so many levels. It traces the development of an important new contribution ot the study of man while keeping the reader step by step in touch with the man who added a humanistic and compassionate insight to the field of Anthropology. Mr. Grinker lends his considerable psychological and anthropological insight to helping the reader understand who and what this great man was. I strongly recommend this book to any reader who wants a gripping read about an extraordinary 20th century intellect who ultimately transcends all of his great achievements through love. Five stars to Mr. Grinker.

Curiosity Satiated
I have been curious about Colin Turnbull ever since I read the "Mountain People" several years ago. As an anthropology student, I identified with Turnbull's willingness to "learn" the lifeways of the "other", and in doing so, reshape his own worldview. I am afraid that this book may have told me a little more than I wanted to know however...
Turnbull's relationship with Joseph Towles is a critical part of the story, and I appreciate and acknowledge that. I had to wonder exactly how the biographer knew the very intimate gastroenterological details that were included in the text. It is just a matter of personal taste, but that is the only reason that I did not give the book a complete five star rating. The book does give us a much needed, intimate portrait of an important anthropologist and human being.

Turnbull's life
This is an interesting book, but I did not find it as compelling as other reviewers. The material is fascinating, but the presentation is a bit plodding and detracts from the narrative. As a fellow academic, I understand Grinker's desire to include the wealth of details his painstaking research uncovered; but as a reader I wished he'd had a more careful editor who would have excised some of the irrelevant, distracting details and polished the presentation of the rest of the book. (Apart from some clumsy writing, there are even spelling and typographical errors in several chapters!)

As for content, Grinker does a decent job explaining Turnbull's fascination with Africa and "the Other." The chapters on Turnbull's early (pre-anthropologist) life are too many and too long for me, but they do help provide a context for what came after. Grinker does offer some important insights on paradoxes in Turnbull's life and on anthropology's connection to colonial projects. If you are interested in the anthropology of Africa, Anglo-American social science, pre- (and post-) Stonewall experiences of gay men, or Turnbull himself, you will probably enjoy the book despite its flaws. But if you have no patience for slow and awkward writing, don't buy this without perusing it first!

Dr. Turnbull
I listened to Dr. Turnbull lecture in West Virginia when I was 19-21 years old in the early eighties in my hometown. At that time I found him an inspiration. He was able to communicate such respect for life, how different people live it and to provide an insight into the beauty of the peoples he had studied. When I saw this book I was delighted because, of course, I was hoping to feel that person I came to know somehow communicated in the text. Broadly I felt the author did not know him, wasn't inspired by him, was fixated on homosexuality in a manner that seemed unlike his subject. At times I "learned "things.Too much, it's like Elie Weisel said one does not always need to know every single detail and often that defames the purpose and meaning-denegrates the memory. In the end I was left feeling life was brutal and disillusioning and a horror in many respects. I think the man I sat down and spoke to years ago, who gave such inspirational lectures, would never have left you this way.This is not a love story , it's a horror story about failed love and man's degredations. In this way I found the book an oddity. I suppose Dr. Turnbull was accused of operation with rose colored specs, but in a sense a teacher deals with the human spirit and he was a very elavating person. Dr. Faini brought him to our world in school , and his love of music and percussion and world instrumentation was so obviously connected to Dr. Turnbull. I prefer to leave my memories intact and hope that the book is seen to be written by a person who wanted to debunk and didn't really know him anyhow. Perhaps he wrote his first draft and published it. ... Read more

Book Description

Psychiatrist and neurologist, Viktor E. Frankl, was the founder of Logotherapy, the third Viennese school of psychiatry, concerned with helping people find meaning in their lives. He developed this system before spending several years in Nazi concentration camps. His book, "Man's Search for Meaning" has influenced millions of people worldwide.

This volume is richly illustrated with photographs of Frankl's life and times, including many painful images of imprisonment in the concentration camps, but also of many joyful family portraits. This volume is a biographical play relating to these most critical times in Frankl's life and much of the dialog is taken verbatim from his own writings, making this drama almost autobiographical.

This volume will appeal to those who are familiar to Frankl's work, and inspire those new to his writings to learn more about this remarkable man and his contributions to humanity. ... Read more

Book Description

Distinguished historian and social activist Manning Marable’s book, W. E. B. Du Bois: Black Radical Democrat, brings out the interconnections, unity, and consistency of W. E. B. Du Bois’s life and writings. Marable covers Du Bois’s disputes with Booker T. Washington, his founding of the NAACP, his work as a social scientist, popular figure, and his involvement in politics, placing them into the context of Du Bois’s views on black pride, equality, and cultural diversity. Marable stresses that, as a radical democrat, Du Bois viewed the problems of racism as intimately connected with capitalism. This second edition, with a new introduction by Marable, comes out in conjunction with the 100th Year Anniversary Edition of Du Bois’s classic Souls of Black Folk. ... Read more

Book Description

This first-person, emotional account of a childprotection service worker in New York State gives the readeran intimate look at all aspects of handling child abusecases: interviewing parents who have been accused of abusingtheir children, talking to abused children removed from theirparents' guardianship, working with an uncaring systemironically designed with the best of intentions, and keepingup with the mounds of paperwork each case generates. Lucidand disturbing, eloquent and passionate, Tender Mercies is amust-read for professionals and laypeople alike! ... Read more

Book Description

Fired by Stanford and the University of Chicago but recommended by his peers to the presidency of the American Economic Association, Thorstein Veblen remains a baffling figure in American intellectual history. In part because he was an eccentric who shunned publicity, he has also been one of our most neglected. Veblen is known to the general public only as coiner of the term "conspicuous consumption," and to scholars primarily as one of many social critics of the reform-minded Progressive Era. This important critical biography--originally published as The Bard of Savagery and now appearing in paperback for the first time--attempts both to unravel the riddles that surround his reputation and to assess his varied and important contributions to modern social theory. ... Read more

Book Description

This book presents the most comprehensive introduction to the life and ideas of Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934) yet written. As a key to understanding one of the most potent influences on developmental theories this century, Van der Veer and Valsiner explore Vygotsky's ideas in the contexts of Russian psychology and the politics of the inter-war years. The authors chart Vygotsky's intellectual development through the course of his life, establishing links with his predecessors and contemporaries and illustrating his intellectual interdependence with the contemporary scientific community and the creative endeavors of the fine arts. Careful analysis of his social context allows detailed discussion of Vygotsky's indebtedness to literary scholarship, with psychoanalysis, Gestalt psychology and paedology. Understanding Vygotsky not only shows the extent to which Vygotsky's work can be further developed to be relevant to the end of the twentieth century but also opens up scope for a more detailed analysis of his contemporaries. It will be essential reading for all students of Vygotsky and his ideas. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Wilhelm Reich--brilliantly insightful psychoanalyst or crackpot scientist? Perhaps both, though belying his reputation as a crackpot is the persistence with which adherents to his orgone theory still tout its application to everything from rainmaking to cancer. Clearly, though, he was a sensitive and deeply caring person who came to the U.S. from a war-torn Europe fully expecting to be welcomed as a man of science. American Odyssey: Letters and Journals 1940-1947 details his most intimate thoughts and communications with family, friends, colleagues, and, inevitably, harassers. His life was filled with high drama, his ego was suitably large for a man whose ideas (he felt) could save the world from itself, and his future was cloudy, but his spirit of perseverance shines throughout.

Despite brief incarceration as an "enemy alien," foreshadowing his eventual defeat at the hands of the FDA and the AMA, he became a loyal, patriotic American, seeing this country as a bulwark against the fascism and communism he knew all too well. The excitement he felt about his work speaks to us through his articulate journal entries, as does his paranoia, though, as the wise say, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you. Unable to de-escalate the mounting struggle over orgone therapy, in 1947 Reich came under the first of many investigations that would finally put him in jail for the rest of his life. His fitting, closing words: "Once again man has killed a warming soul, stabbed a heart burning for him. Once again they gave power to their little sergeants." --Rob Lightner ... Read more

Reviews (2)

A superb book for anyone interested in Reich
Wilhelm Reich was many things in his lifetime- a student of Freud, a political activist, a research scientist, and an inventor. His work was decades ahead of its time and is finally being rediscovered and reevaluated by the public. If, like me, you are interested in Reich and his work, you might want to check out a novel called We All Fall Down, by Brian Caldwell. it draws heavily on Reich's theories, particularly Listen Little Man and The Mass Psychology Of Facism. It's a great introduction to Reich's work and the entire novel draws heavily on his theory. It's very interesting watching an author explore his theories in a fictional setting. Well worth reading.

A must-read for anyone interested in Reich's personality
American Odyssey is a lush garden filled with the innermost thoughts of Wilhelm Reich during the period he was establishing himself in America in the 1940's. He will have you smiling one moment and welling up with tears the next as you follow him through the maze of his lifework that evidences his being one of humanity's most creative and harrassed thinkers. Reich's concepts are certainly in line with free-thought today. His legacy of leaving his archives to the "children of the future," since they alone would most likely be the ones to understand and accept what he discovered, is falling nicely into place - exactly as Reich knew it would. ... Read more

Book Description

In 1983, after years of trying to persuade Bruno Bettelheim to write his autobiography, Theron Raines, his friend and literary agent, himself undertook to tell the life of the renowned but often controversial child psychologist. With no thought of writing a conventional biography, Raines began a series of interviews in which Bettelheim reflected at length upon the major moments—triumphs, crises, and tragedies—of his extraordinary life. Rising to the Light is the fascinating synthesis of these encounters and of Raines’s interviews with counselors, teachers, and former students from the world-famous Orthogenic School.

Here is Bettelheim’s sudden passage from a life of wealth and luxury in Vienna to the appalling brutality of Dachau and Buchenwald, where his intellect helped him survive the horrific conditions that often broke down a prisoner’s personality. His understanding of the parallels between the extreme situation of a concentration-camp prisoner and the inner world of a disturbed child would shape him as a therapist. Here is his voyage from the Old World to the New, and his professional ascent in Chicago, where he developed a total therapeutic milieu for children unable to survive emotionally at home or in any other school. Though he had no specialized training, he was uniquely qualified by his uncanny insights into children and his deep Freudian and post-Freudian convictions about human nature and behavior. Based on his success as a clinician and teacher, he would go on to become a best-selling author. But toward the end of a long life, Bettelheim would succumb to a stroke and to a devastating depression intensified by his feelings of uselessness when he was no longer able to do the work that had been his daily salvation for so many decades. Raines, who visited him twice in his last weeks, also gives us the days just before the puzzling suicide of this man who had endured and built so much.

Despite his demonstrably tireless commitment to children, Bettelheim’s reputation was blemished after his death by attacks on his writings and his unorthodox clinical methods, in particular his use of physical discipline in the psychotherapeutic setting. Raines’s conversations with Bettelheim have much to tell us about this bitterly disputed aspect of his legacy, and they reveal a complex man who had to explore the boundary between compassion and brutality.

Rising to the Light is a portrait of a great teacher; it gives us a more direct line of sight into the Bettelheim enigma than any other book is likely to provide. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

An easy read
So many times have I heard stories about career(or dream)-ending injuries and knew it wasn't as mellow to them as they made it seem. It was nice to see Robinson rewarded with the HOF(Seton Hall) in the end. Biggio was destined for greatness, Valentin was better than I thought he was, and Vaughn was a monster from the start. They all have some facinating human stories that make it hard to look at them the same.

A very fine read -- especially for baseball fans
The Hit Men and the Kid Who Batted Ninth by sports writer David Siroty is an involved and involving study of the lives of Craig Biggio, Mo Vaughn, and John Valentin, three renowned baseball players, each of whom earned MVP honors, Gold Gloves, and more, -- as well as the life of Marteese Robinson, a friend and college teammate of the three men who was left behind from the professional baseball world. Robinson would eventually find a way to join his friends; just not a way that any of them expected. The Hit Men and the Kid Who Batted Ninth is an engaging tale, featuring an aside with a quotable quote from the men it spotlights on almost every page, as well as an inset section of black-and-white photographs. The Hit Men And The Kid Who Batted Ninth is a very fine read -- especially for baseball fans.

A must read for any baseball fan
Maybe I'm a bit biased since two of the four players profiled in this book are now Mets, but I really enjoyed their stories. Siroty takes you from their childhoods through college, to the minor leagues and the majors. Every player has a different path, and not all of them have the traditional happy endings. Every page mentions a new player whose name you'll recognize - I always wondered how every baseball player seemed to know each other, even if their teams never competed. You'll love this book if you love baseball - because it really shows the players' passion for the game.

Wish I was there!
David Siroty writes a factually accurrate account of the Hit Men from Seton Hall. As a former Pirate player, I spent some time with these guys and they were all good guys and had one distinguishing trait in common; they all had the burning desire to play the great game of baseball. Excellent job by Siroty telling a great story about the greatest game on the face of the earth.
Brought back good memories. Wish I was there!
Can't wait to bring my son to Mike Sheppard's Basball Camp...keep the hustle.
PS: Marteese Robinson was one of the nicest guys in our high school, SHP. ... Read more

Book Description

WHO IS ARTHUR FORD? Even those who knew him well struggle with this question. Now, more than a quarter century after his death in 1971, this anthology brings together a variety of perspectives to give us a fascinating picture of an extraordinary and complicated man.

He was catapulted into fame by his unrivaled talent as a medium, and his life was shaped by his efforts to understand and make peace with this gift. The veracity of the information he offered during trance was confirmed over and over, yet there always lingered that shadow of a doubt. Are these suspicions well-founded, or are they the result of our reluctance to accept the possibility that life continues after death? ... Read more

Reviews (1)

An excellent introduction to Ford
I bought this as an introduction to Arthur Ford, and it serves that purpose admirably. It is a shortish volume published by the Spiritual Frontiers Fellowship, which Ford was instrumental in founding. It is, therefore, solidly pro-Ford -- but it doesn't ignore his personal flaws or the controversies surrounding his mediumship. It consists of passages from Ford's own writings as well as the writings of his closest associates. One particularly interesting part concerns an auto wreck in which Ford's sister and a friend were killed and he was left in a coma. Writing 25 years before anyone had heard the term "Near Death Experience," he described a classic NDE. In case you aren't familiar with Ford, he had nearly a 50-year career. Two of his main claims to fame were solving the riddle of the message Houdini had left for his wife ("Rosabelle, believe") and putting Bishop Pike in touch with his late son. I previously hadn't taken Ford seriously due to the controversy surrounding the Houdini episode and some of the other anti-Ford propaganda, but this book led me to do additional digging. Ford clearly seems to have had a great deal of genuine mediumistic ability (whatever that may be). He was also a complex individual who would make an interesting study even if he had been a complete fraud. I would recommend this as an excellent introduction to Ford (or a good summing up as to what he was all about, if you are already familiar with him). ... Read more

Reviews (3)

Aurel Stein: Pioneer of the Silk Road
Aurel Stein was not without his faults. From all indications, he believed in the white man's burden, and probably would have tolerated fascism for its efficiency except for the realization that Hitler's brand of it included anti-Semitism, and Stein was Jewish. Even the subtitle of the book, Pioneer of the Silk Road, is Eurocentric: there were already people living in the areas Stein explored, members of tribes Stein seems to have had no interest in or ability to differentiate among. Stein was the first white archaeologist in the area, and he did open up new methods of what can only be called archaeological plunder. Stein felt that if he hadn't taken those antiquities, there was a good chance they would have been destroyed where they were. He didn't know they'd sit unviewed in the British Museum for almost a hundred years after he took them. The real crime is that they are not now given back to China to help right past injustices. Stein's racial and cultural attitudes were a product of his time. He was too stuck in the framework of his own culture to be able to judge any other culture except by the standards of his own. Annabel Walker acknowledges Stein's shortcomings and yet brings him to life as an interesting, sympathetic individual. He loved his family and friends and dogs dearly, but beyond that, he loved the great Asian wildernesses that he roamed in, often at extreme peril. Walker evokes those places, makes us see them as he did. Walker shows us the "pluck", as Stein liked to call it, of the man, as well as his determination to shape his life as he wanted it, to pursue what interested him. He died the way he lived, in action, pursuing his dream even in his old age. Annabel Walker writes with insight and equanimity. Her research is painstaking, her writing style enjoyable and thought-provoking.

Memory of lost civilizations
It is only through the work and people like Aurel Stein that we can retain knowledge of the past which otherwise would be forgotten and lost in the hands of specialized predators and thieves. Well written book.

Thief
The man and his "competitors" were not above your common grave diggers. They simply dug and hauled treasures and historic artifacts out of their resting places and rubbed a people and the land of their heritage.

Shame on those who consider them true archeologists. ... Read more

Reviews (1)

A Mesmorizing Journey...Extreme Psychological Insights
"The Wall and other short stories" is a triumph in literature. Each story explores the depths of human thought and reason through an existential point of view. Each story can be interpreted different by all readers, therefore making this a great book for discussion.

"The Wall" is the first story presented. It consumes the reader because of its brilliant writing style. The story is narrated by a man named Pablo Ibbieta, who is in a jail cell with 2 others awaiting execution the following morning. Every event that transpires that particular night is analyzed almost too thoroughly thus leaving the reader in a trance. I wont get into it too deeply, but believe me, this story is worth reading...i guarentee it will have to be read again. After finishing the story, I felt as though nothing mattered. Who cares if the dishes were not washed, who cares if I would be late for work. Believe me, this story will have a profound impact on the way you think. Don't be surprised if you have a new appreciation for life. This story enlightens the mind.

Another great story from this book is called "Erostratus". Erostratus was a character who wanted to be famous, so he burned down the temple of Ephesus, which was one of the 7 wonders of the world. This is the central symbol of the story, the quest for glory. It also brings up an interesting point when the narrator asks one of his colleagues "Who built Ephesus?" and the colleauge did not know, he only knew who burned it. "Erostratus" in short is one mans decent into madness because of his quest to be remembered. The ending of "Erostratus" is filled with suspense and makes your heart beat in fear. It serves as a grim reminder that there are people of this type, and we should be prepared at any time for them to strike.

There are also 3 other stories, that being "The Room", "Intimacy", and "The Childhood of a Leader", which also draw the reader inside the workings of the mind through an existential window (ie: we are all here by accident, man is condemned to choose).

In short, these stories are all perfect, and leave the reader with a feeling of enlightment. Sartre is an extremely intelligent and clever writer. This is evident in these short stories. So turn off the television, buy this book, and start questioning your existence, you owe it to yourself. Besides, they are short stories, so you will be able to get through at least one a day...that isnt much to ask considering the benefits you will reap by reading them. ... Read more

Reviews (9)

Delve into new ground within the realm of pscyhology
As a Master's candidate studying psychology, I am thrilled to have stumbled upon this book! Finally, some of the "darker" areas of the field have been illuminated by a first-hand expert.
Written in a conversational tone, this book is safely navigated by the jargon-wary among us, and is entertaining as well as educational. Pick this one up if you have an interest in the fringe movements in psychology, have an open-minded approach to what is considered therapeutic, and/or simply are intrigued by the spiritually enhancing capabilities of psychedelic drugs.

Mind expanding and soul healing
Let me try this again. The Secret Chief is a fantastically written, conversational and often warm and humorous overview of a real pioneer in the field of psychology. Few researchers or clinicians are willing to boldly sidestep well-known but mostly unfounded restrictions on their practice.
The hero of this story is a man that truly put his clients/patients first and upheld their well being as the foremost goal. From his uncanny ability to listen to what they were saying to his courage and wisdom in guiding them along the path toward recovery and growth, the reader is brought in to delightfully pick up on the knowledge gained.
Operating not just from a medical expert perspective but from a caring human being equally engaged in the challenge of life, the therapist intuitively, assertively spurs the client onto self discovery and mind expansion. Tools of the psychological trade vary. The respective benefits of varying methods of therapy are discussed, and the trail blazing of supposed "radical" "innovative" methods occurs. That they have ever been explored is impressive. That there is a definite need to continue research and practice in this field is made resoundingly evident within the pages of this remarkable, insightful book.

Highly recommended.

Brian Wallace, author, Labyrinth of Chaos

Makes a trilogy with 'Acid Dreams' and 'Storming Heaven'
This book reveals some of the true promise of psychedelic therapy that is obscured in other popular histories of the era that focus on the (albeit fascinating) aftermath of Dr. Leary et. al. ('Acid Dreams' and 'Storming Heaven').

The most valuable aspect of the book, and its main focus, is an oral walkthrough of a session with the therapist Jacob. Mr. Stolaroff has done a valuable service in preserving Jacob's insights into what works and what doesnt work.

Though, I was confused when Jacob described his purely religious orientation to the therapy yet didnt elaborate hardly at all on his own 'theological' outlook or experiences.

Also, in my opinion, Jacob goes to an extreme in asserting at one point that transformation *requires* such entheogens. He seems to unfairly discount the traditional religious retreat practices and experiences.

Personally, I side with the theory that such entheogens merely unveil latent faculties that can be cultivated by traditional retreat type practices without the need for entheogens at all.

Also, one danger, perhaps, in the outlook and process described in this book, is its almost complete lack of orientation to 'Right View' (in the Buddhist sense) as the precursor to 'awakening'. The Buddha stressed that insight into Right View was a key prerequisite. Yet, this therapy seems to presume it is largely irrelevant.

I would recommend Thaddeus Golas' 'The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment' as a complement to this book, as Golas himself broke through via entheogens, yet does not see them as absolutely necessary, and focuses on orienting to 'Right View' first as the means to awaken (his book is out of print, but available online now, search for the title in google).

a warm, compassionate individual
This book is about a man who dared to question and probe the inner workings of mind and soul in order to heal others.

What a rocker!

A magical mystery tour of the mind
This book points to the possibility of remembering the parts of ourselves we forgot long ago. It's a poem to the forgotten realms of being human and declares the potential to reclaim ones totality. For someone thinking of using psychedelics, there are instructions here for their proper use. For someone who has already used them, there are footnotes from infinitude. This book, and this subject will change you. No longer will you be stained by the propaganda of the drug war. The sacrements of freedom exist. Whether they be psychedelics, meditation, yoga or dreaming. A friendly, helpful voice speaks out to you from the pages of this book. You will be better for listening. Be careful, this is not recreation. This is you, that you are exploring. Have some respect. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Multiperspective View of Leary
Timothy Leary is a mythological figure. Almost everyone has an opinion of him, even if they have never read a word he wrote.
Often opinions are second-hand filtered through this or that media source.

The editor for this book, Robert Forte, one
of Mircea Eliade's last students at the University of Chicago,
does not provide us with second-hand information that he has digested, but instead, gathers an anthology of viewpoints from those who knew Timothy Leary. Not all are positive, and I was surprized to read the negative remarks of Owlsley Stanley in regards to Leary. Thanks to this compendium, we are allowed past the veil of the myth and get a glimpse of the human Timothy Leary.

Robert Forte knew Timothy Leary personally and has edited another book, Entheogens and the Future of religion, that I highly recommend.

Thomas Seay

a refreshingly honest multi-angled profile of Leary
Robert Forte is one of the most important living documentarians of psychedelic history and phenomonology. In this book, he's gathered a myriad voices of people who were really "there" when Leary was influencing people and who therefore have valuable commentary worth hearing -- both positive and negative. The folksy, chatty style of this book make it a pleasure to read. Along with his other book "Entheogens and the Future of Religion," Forte is performing an important informational and documentary service toward a fair assessment of the role that drugs have in society and also of the real-life figures who have affected this. This book is a must read for anyone interested in what Tim Leary (and for that matter, ...) were really like.

Best written book about Tim Leary
If you ever wanted to get a realistic personal perspective of an individual who influenced the world as we know it, read this book. Thank you Robert Forte.

Distinguished contributors, comprehensive & even-handed.
For anyone having an interest in Leary, friend or foe, fan or scholar, it's all here from the best first-person sources. "You get the Leary you deserve", he said about himself, and an array of Leary's are presented, as remembered by a marvelous and distinguished group. Bravo to editor Robert Forte. ... Read more

Book Description

Mary E. Richmond (1861-1928) was a contemporary of Jane Addams and an influential leader in the American charity organization movement.In this biography--the first in-depth study of Richmond's life and work--Elizabeth N. Agnew examines the contributions of this important, if hitherto under-valued, woman to the field of charity and to its development into professional social work.

Orphaned at a young age and largely self-educated, Richmond initially entered charity work as a means of self-support, but came to play a vital role in transforming philanthropy--previously seen as a voluntary expression of individual altruism--into a valid, organized profession. Her career took her from charity organization leadership in Baltimore and Philadelphia to an executive position with the prestigious Russell Sage Foundation in New York City.

Richmond's progressive civic philosophy of social work was largely informed by the social gospel movement. She strove to find practical applications of the teachings of Christianity in response to the social problems that accompanied rapid industrialization, urbanization, and poverty. At the same time, her tireless efforts and personal example as a woman created an appealing, if ambiguous, path for other professional women. A century later her legacy continues to echo in social work and welfare reform. . ... Read more