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Title: The Divided Self: An Existential Study in Sanity and Madness (Selected Works of R.D. Laing, 1) by R. D. Laing, R.D. Liang ISBN: 0-415-19818-6 Publisher: Routledge Pub. Date: April, 1999 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $85.00

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Average Customer Rating: 4.6 (15 reviews)

Rating: 5
Summary: Master and Slave
Comment: Foucault wrote in madness and civilization: "The constitution of madness as a mental illness, at the end of the eighteenth century, affords the evidence of a broken dialogue.... In the serene world of mental illness, modern man no longer communicates with the madman."

Psychiatric dogma says that Schizophrenics are incapable of human relationships; that it is impossible to meaningfully dialogue with schizophrenics. Laing in this work develops an existential account of madness, which is in direct opposition to the modern dogma of psychiatry. He shows, with the aid of case studies, that madness should be viewed from the 'inside'; that is, people diagnosed as psychotic should be understood; a conversation/relationship should and can be developed. This is the very thing to be avoided according to the modern idea that the mentally ill are merely objects of 'scientific ' enquiry; patients to be diagnosed and treated.

Also developed in the book is the idea that public sanity is not identical with wisdom or truth. As Laing says early in the book " ... The cracked mind of the schizophrenic may let in light which does not enter the intact minds of many sane people whose minds are closed". This is not altogether new, Socrates saw "the superiority of heaven-sent madness over man-made sanity". The idea seems to have been lost in our current culture where the standards of sanity and reason are in large part intellectual constructions; formed by supposed 'experts' of the human condition or by the sloganistic and emotive words of public opinion devoid of all fixed meaning.

The book is informative and just great reading.

Rating: 5
Summary: Beginning of a Great but Now Forgotten Change
Comment: This is a book written by a truly independent mind exploring mainly with his own original thought that permits the experience that developes with 'patients' unfold on its own. Originally written in 1956, it is nonetheless relatively absent of mindless psychiatric jargon designed to stop people from thinking and coming to their own conclusions. R. D. Laing will go on beyond this book in his future radical development that essentially puts in fundamental question the very purpose and meaning of psychiatry, but leaves behind, supposedly, some ideas that I find fascinating and maybe he developed later under other names. Specifically, his consideration of ontology leads directly to question the very nature of 'insanity'. The way he describes schizophrenia, paying only lip service to the POSSIBILITY of a chemical/genetic cause, is to all intents and purposes a clear exploration of minds taking the pathway of philosophy itself, specifically dealing with fundamental ontology, the nature of the real, the nature of the self, the nature, meaning, and importance of their own emotions, but doing so completely on their own, without educational preparation of any sort, and not even knowing what they are dealing with are the same questions serious philosophers tangle with in great difficulty. The result, then, would be like someone with no architectural training trying to build a twenty story building: chaos, confusion, and inevitably a crash. One key point to understanding Laing is his quote from Sartre at the beginning of one of his chapters to the effect that Sartre no longer believes in the existence of PSYCHOLOGY ITSELF any longer. Rather, that field is much more accurately handled by BIOGRAPHY!

Rating: 3
Summary: Confusion
Comment: I read this book without having a good reason really, I saw it in the bookshop and decided it might be interesting. As it stands it was increadibly difficult to understand. Had it been written in the 18th or 19th century I may have understood it better, late 20th century again maybe I would have got it. But the period between the end of the 1st world war and the start of the 80s... I cant get into the mindset of it.

I understood and recognised in myself a lot of the mindsets of the "schizoid" in this book, yet I didn't relate or connect with it at all, which left me somewhat bewildered. The language used was too academic for me really, but I was severly sleep deprived when I read it. A further comment is that the worldveiw promoted by psychology is one I am extremely sceptical of.

It left me with many questions however, so in that respect it was a brilliant book, because any book, especially a "non-fiction" book should always leave the reader desperatly curious about the topic. On that front it did well.

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