The Mind's Fate

With keen insight and grace, Robert Cole examines an impressive span of subjects: the problematic intersection between American culture and psychiatry; the work of pioneering psychological theorists, from Sigmund and Anna Freud to R. D. Laing, Erik Erikson, and Bruno Bettelheim; the risks and rewards of psychohistory; the psychological value of the spiritual life; the contributions of such authors as Walker Percy, William Styron, Raymond Carver, and Cormac McCarthy; the "fever of genius" of van Gogh; the nature of white racism; the making of a moral life; and his own theories of child development. Throughout, these intellectually powerful and humane essays reflect Dr. Coles's view of psychiatry as an enterprise extending far beyond the clinic. "In some way we must manage to blend poetic insight with a craft and unite intimately the rational and the intuitive, the aloof stance of the scholar with the passion and affection of the friend who cares and is moved.".