tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14395358800469404462024-02-19T11:16:16.636+00:00David Austin: Writing with Considered IntentDavid Austin is the author of <i><b>Delivered Unto Lions</b></i>, a novel inspired by the hidden world of 1970s child psychiatric ‘care’. This blog focuses on issues related (sometimes tangentially) to this topic.David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.comBlogger40125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-49303007790026553172015-10-15T12:23:00.000+01:002015-10-17T10:59:53.416+01:00<h2 style="text-align: center;">
<b>Remembering Phoebe M. Rees</b></h2>
<br />
The name Gertrude Phoebe Meirion Rees OBE may not be immediately familiar to many people. Neither would the name Phoebe M. Rees, as she was more commonly known. But if I were to mention that for more than 60 years there has been a full-length play competition known as ‘The Phoebe Rees’ you might reasonably assume that she is a noteworthy figure in the world of drama and writing. And you would be correct. <br />
<br />
When recalling eventful or interesting things that have happened in my life, I often wish I had had the foresight to make some notes at the time the experiences were taking place. The memory is often a very fragile and capricious thing. Some elements can be recalled with great clarity (though accuracy may sometimes be a little less certain), while others may be completely forgotten. Regrettably, I made no notes whatsoever on the day when I met Phoebe Rees at her home in (or near) Williton, Somerset (actually in Five Bells, Watchet).<br />
<br />
I am certain that the year was 1975. I was eleven. I sat with my father at a plain and somehow under-burdened table in a shadowy room. My attention was taken by what appeared to be a commonplace transistor radio sitting upon the table. But this was not an ordinary radio. It was designed to receive the sound from television channels; indeed, it <i>was</i> a television, but without a screen. We were in the home of a blind lady.<br />
<br />
How my father had come to know of this lady, or what
circumstances had led to us being welcomed into her home, I cannot recall. But here we
were. <br />
<br />
Across the width of the room was a window through which only the most subdued of light was able to enter. The area outside the window was overgrown with burgeoning foliage, but its greenery somehow softened the gloom. Adjacent to the window was a work surface upon which rested an ageing manual typewriter. <br />
<br />
Somewhere between the dim window and the table at which my father and I were perched was the seated figure of an elderly woman. This was Phoebe Rees. It was difficult to make out any details of her appearance in the gloom, and her face was further obscured by a pair of large dark glasses. Some lost rays from the window alighted upon her full and silvery hair, and as she turned her head it was possible to make out a slightly weeping closed eye.<br />
<br />
As an immature eleven-year-old I found Phoebe’s image a little unsettling, but not frightening. She certainly gave an impression of being rather ethereal, of being not quite of this world – qualities no doubt exaggerated by the unlit uncertainty of the room. But she was, nonetheless, friendly and very open to answering any questions that I might have for her, however indelicate or outlandish.<br />
<br />
So, what was it about Phoebe Rees that might have invited such intoxicated questions from a young boy? Well, prior to meeting her I was aware that she was a playwright, and I had had the opportunity to read one of her plays. Until recently I had been unable recall the title, but I now know that it was <i>The White Dove of Bardon</i>. It was an historical supernatural tale which made reference to a local house on Tower Hill – and I lived at an address in Tower Hill! (But the memory cheats; <i>White Dove</i> actually makes no reference to a house on Tower Hill at all, but to Tower Hill, <i>London</i>!) <br />
<br />
I had been told that Phoebe had a certain supernatural or spiritual sensitivity, that when her writing made mention of ghosts or spirits she was sometimes writing with the benefit of personal experience. <i>White Dove</i> was certainly a ghostly tale, though it is hard to see how this particular play could have been inspired by her own experience; the clear inspiration is a fascination with history, both local and national.<br />
<br />
So out poured my questions about ghosts, about how she was able to continue writing if she was blind, and so on. The question about writing was easily answered. She had learnt to touch-type when much younger and sighted, and with the skill being so well developed, typing with accuracy was no challenge to her as long as her fingers started on the ‘home keys’. But when it came to ghosts or spirits, it was as if the transparency of her words became mislaid in the intangible character of her presence and the darker niches of an overcast room.<br />
<br />
I was under the impression that her ‘spiritual sensitivity’ was something that had developed following the onset of blindness, but it is clear from the corpus of Phoebe’s work that supernatural themes were present in some of her plays while she was still sighted. Perhaps she had became more ‘spiritually sensitive’ after she had lost her sight, or maybe an existing interest had guided interpretation of her experiences unseeing. Both my memory and speculation fail to produce any answer.<br />
<br />
Undeterred by Phoebe’s opacity, I began to offer my own ideas, some of them drawn from the language of science – or rather the pseudo-science of popular science fiction – rather than from the language of the paranormal or spiritual. She listened patiently, but in the end what seemed to matter to Phoebe was experience rather than explanation. To quote the character of William Leigh in <i>The White Dove of Bardon</i>,<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I can offer you no scientific proof […]. Such things are matters of a deep, inner, spiritual experience which can be described but which cannot be shared. </blockquote>
Did it matter whether the phenomena she experienced were the ghosts of the deceased? Some other kind of ‘spiritual beings’? Or something else entirely? What was important was that these experiences were meaningful to her and that they informed some of her writing. <br />
<br />
So were Phoebe’s spectral experiences real? <i>Yes</i>! At the very least they were real because they had a <i>real effect</i> on the world through her writing. Beyond that, who can judge the privileged experiences of another person? <br />
<br />
And so, in due course, my meeting with Phoebe Rees came to an end. She gave me a slim volume in a plain pale blue cover. It was a copy of her play <i>Tell Mother – The Butterflies</i>, one of her more recent plays with some supernatural content. I took it home and enjoyed it, just as I had enjoyed <i>White Dove</i>. But what endures most is the knowledge that I had the good fortune to meet such a unique, talented and affecting person.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Some of Phoebe M. Rees’ Works</b></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><b>in alphabetical order </b></span></div>
<br />
<i>The Answer.</i> (1956). London: J Garnet Miller.<br />
<br />
<i>Blinds Up</i>. (1939). London: T Nelson.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: A ‘modern drama’.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Breaking The Barrier</i>. (1983). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<br />
<br />
<i>The Dream</i>. (1963). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<br />
<br />
<i>Hide And Seek</i>. (1937). London: H F W Deane & Sons.<br />
<br />
<i>Idols</i>. (1937). London: J B Pinker & Son.<br />
<br />
<i>Incorruptible, or the First Dictator.</i> (1935). London: J Garnet Miller.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: An historical comedy drama with chorus!</span><br />
<br />
<i>The Last Straw</i>. (1947). London: H F W Deane & Sons.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: A ‘farcical comedy’. About country life.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Marriages Are Made In Heaven</i>. (1946). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: Television version produced by Westward TV (ITV), circa 1968-69. </span><br />
<br />
<i>The May Tree</i>. (1939). <br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Notes: A supernatural radio play based on <i>A College Mystery</i> by A P Baker. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Radio play broadcast on the BBC Regional Programme (Western), 11 April 1939. </span><br />
<br />
<i>The Miraculous Year, or Dorothy Wordsworth In Somerset</i>. (1971). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<i></i><br />
<br />
<i>Mix-Up-Atosis</i>. (1955). London: H F W Deane & Sons.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: Comedy.</span><br />
<br />
<i>The New Jerusalem</i>. (1966). London: J Garnet Miller.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: About Glastonbury legends.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Pushion and Pests (Rats)</i>. (1938). London: H F W Deane & Sons.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: Comedy.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Rats</i>. (1936). London: H F W Deane & Sons.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Notes: Comedy. About country life.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Sanctuary</i>. (1934). London: H F W Deane & Sons.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Notes: Historical. About a plot to assassinate Napoleon.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Second Wedding</i>. (1940). London: T Nelson.<br />
<br />
<i>The Summons</i>. (n.d.). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<br />
<br />
<i>TV Thriller</i>. (1959). London: H F W Deane & Sons. <br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: A ‘burlesque comedy’.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Tell Mother - The Butterflies</i>. (1969). Watchet: Rees.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Notes: Supernatural. Story suggested by some events recounted in the book <i>Things I Cannot Explain</i> by Margaret Gordon Moore.</span><br />
<br />
<i>That Freedom</i>. (1962). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<br />
<br />
<i>That There Dog</i>. (1931). London: H F W Deane & Sons.<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Notes: Comedy. Was given radio broadcast under title <i>Thic Thare Dawg</i>, BBC 5WA Cardiff, 18 June 1931.</span><br />
<br />
<i>Time Is Money</i>. (1958). <br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Notes: Prose. Broadcast as a <i>Morning Story</i> on the BBC Light Programme, 9 January 1958.</span><br />
<br />
<i>The Trumpet Shall Sound</i>. (1947). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Note: About Saul of Tarsus.</span><br />
<br />
<i>White Dove Of Bardon</i>. (1951). London: Steele's Play Bureau (J Garnet Miller).<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Notes: Historical, supernatural. An earlier version (shorter than the published stage version) was produced by Owen Reed and broadcast on the BBC Home Service, 12 July 1948. A second radio production by Brandon Action-Bond was broadcast on the BBC Home Service, 17 October 1956.</span><br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Further Reading/Reference Materials</b></span></div>
<br />
Allen, S. (2013, September). The Phoebe Rees life story. <i>Spotlight: The magazine of the Somerset Fellowship of Drama</i>, p. 6. Retrieved from <br />
<a href="http://www.somersetdrama.org.uk/images/spotlights/60.pdf">http://www.somersetdrama.org.uk/images/spotlights/60.pdf</a><br />
<br />
Chidgey, M. & J. (2003). <i>The book of Stogumber, Monksilver, Nettlecombe & Elworthy</i>. Wellington, Som.: Halsgrove.<br />
<br />
Pardoe, R. (2005, September). A P Baker and A College Mystery. <i>The ghosts & scholars M R James newsletter</i>, 8. Retrieved from <br />
<a href="http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~pardos/GSNews8.html">http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~pardos/GSNews8.html</a><br />
<br />
Phoebe plays in Minehead... fifty years ago. (2013, December). <i>Spotlight: The magazine of the Somerset Fellowship of Drama</i>, p. 12. Retrieved from <br />
<a href="http://www.somersetdrama.org.uk/images/spotlights/63.pdf">http://www.somersetdrama.org.uk/images/spotlights/63.pdf</a><br />
<br />
Phoebe Rees listings on <i>BBC Genome</i>. (n.d.). Retrieved from<br />
<a href="http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/search/0/20?order=asc&q=phoebe+rees#search">http://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/search/0/20?order=asc&q=phoebe+rees#search</a><br />
<br />
<br />
____________ <br />
<br />
<i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press<br />
ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5<br />
<br />
For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-77457750296821987782013-12-10T16:15:00.001+00:002013-12-10T16:40:36.861+00:00<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Aspiring to Freedom: </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Promise of a Sweet Word</span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Sometimes there are words that reach
across the years which still have the power to move. Often, if those
words are accompanied by a melody, they can more easily embed
themselves in the unconscious, but when prompted by an external event
or an inner emotion they can rise up to the surface again.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
An ‘earworm’ is a catchy musical
phrase which continuously repeats in the mind long after it has
stopped playing. But ‘earworm’ does not adequately describe what
I’m writing about now. This is something <i><span style="font-weight: normal;">more</span></i>
than that. This is a musical and lyrical phrase that bubbles up from
deep in the past to come alive again in the present. What is more,
that phrase prompts recall of the whole message.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Around 20 to 25 years ago, when I was
still a relatively young man, I was a keen follower of the band <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fat_and_Frantic">Fat and Frantic</a>. You may not have heard of them, but they had a large
and very loyal cult following in the UK; large enough to ensure that
many of their concerts sold out, large enough to propel them onto
radio and TV – but not quite large enough to break their music into
the mainstream charts.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Among the band’s eclectic mix of
novelty, jazz-flavoured pop, gospel and ‘piffle’ (punk-skiffle)
were a number of songs on the theme of social justice. You could
call them protest songs. One of these was ‘<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrwPKRZG2AY">Freedom is a Sweet Word</a>’ (written by Fat and Frantic vocalist and trumpet-player Jim
Harris). It is this particular <span style="font-style: normal;">song
that winds its way through the years (it was first released in 1987)
to circulate around my consciousness today.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Anyone who has followed my intermittent
blog will know that I am particularly concerned with gaining
recognition for past injustices in children’s and adolescents’
mental healthcare settings. But I also have a wider concern for
justice in general. I can’t help but find myself angry on behalf
of those belittled and dis-empowered within our society on whatever
grounds. People can – in effect – be <i>disabled</i><span style="font-style: normal;">
by </span><span style="font-style: normal;">our s</span><span style="font-style: normal;">ociety
and its institutions</span><i> </i>for a whole swathe of reasons.
These reasons can, of course, include mental health problems – but
they also include class, ethnicity, sexuality, physical health
problems, religious affiliation, and so on. </div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh995UGryY6OoOh9cJ9A6JjtCI_4RHeNz6oSZ834UEw0vYPqs-l_wdg-TO8saUJ6iI1nUlY-G4WTlqZ-f-3287MaXujBhH3-bQTP_-VupK7MvaJqY__ljC-FvE8sZNDHyXU1zjU_SLprvk/s1600/Aggressive+Sunbathing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh995UGryY6OoOh9cJ9A6JjtCI_4RHeNz6oSZ834UEw0vYPqs-l_wdg-TO8saUJ6iI1nUlY-G4WTlqZ-f-3287MaXujBhH3-bQTP_-VupK7MvaJqY__ljC-FvE8sZNDHyXU1zjU_SLprvk/s320/Aggressive+Sunbathing.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
‘Freedom is a Sweet Word’ reflects
back to me, and puts into clear and concise words. some of my own
thoughts and feelings on this broad subject. The song has nothing to
do with mental health as such, but it resonates with what I have
witnessed and experienced in a mental healthcare setting. It speaks
of those who limit the freedom of others because they are fortunate
enough to be ‘Barclaycard carrying members of the free’, because
they have the power to exercise ‘freedom without justice’. These
are the people with the means (symbolised by the Barclaycard) who can
dominate and control those who are <i>denied</i> – or who have <i>lost
–</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> </span><span style="font-style: normal;">the
</span>means. These ‘members of the free’ can absolve themselves
of any responsibility towards the less free; in fact, they gain their
freedom <i>from</i> the less free. This is because those without
means are labelled as failing to use their freedom as
‘constructively’ as those with the Barclaycards.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
It is certainly the case that if you
were ever a child in a psychiatric institution you will know what it
was like to have your freedom limited by those ‘Barclaycard
carrying members of the free’. These ‘members of the free’
were the adults who made the decisions, the people with the means –
doctors, nurses, social workers, etc. Some of them may have
exercised their means properly and responsibly, while others may have
abused their means. Together, however, they gave the institution
they served <i>power</i><span style="font-style: normal;">: </span><span style="font-style: normal;">t</span><span style="font-style: normal;">he
institution had </span><span style="font-style: normal;">all the
p</span><span style="font-style: normal;">ower; you </span><span style="font-style: normal;">had
none.</span><i> </i>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
The difficulty with not having means
and power – not having that Barclaycard, so to speak – is that
it’s very difficult to claw your way up from whatever belittled or
dis-empowered state you are in. But as the song says, that freedom
‘shines and glistens like a star’, and so it is still something
to aspire to. Furthermore, not everyone exercises ‘freedom without
justice’; there are some who know both freedom <i>and</i> justice,
and that is why I can hear that song playing in my head and find <i>hope</i>
in it.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">____________
</span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
‘<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Freedom
is a Sweet Word’ by Fat and Frantic is </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">released by </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Classic
Fox Records / I'll Call You Records</span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">
</span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Delivered
Unto Lions</i></span> <span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">by David
Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">ISBN
978-1-906628-21-5</span></div>
<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">For
more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></span></span></div>
David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-6129681443831977992013-03-16T18:10:00.000+00:002013-10-18T18:13:46.259+01:00<br />
<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Some Words in Praise of the NHS</span></div>
<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-size: large;"> <i><span style="font-style: normal;">–</span></i> and the Gift of Choice</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">At
time of writing there has been widely reported ‘bad news’ in the
British press and broadcast media concerning the NHS (National Health
Service). A government adviser has pointed out that there have been
20,000 avoidable deaths in certain poorly performing hospitals over
<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/mar/16/ignored-nhs-hospital-warning-claims">the last decade</a>.
Needless to say, this is scandalous. But my intention here is </span></i><i><i>not</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
to condemn the NHS, despite some very serious failings in some areas
of the country.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Those
who have read some of my previous blog entries will know that I have
often touched upon a particular issue that, by implication,
incorporates criticism of the NHS. That issue is the historic abuse
or inappropriate treatment of people – especially children and
young people – within mental healthcare settings (and one setting
in particular). </span></i>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Indeed,
as a result of my book </span></i><i><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
I occasionally hear from people with their own horror stories related
to past mental health treatment within the NHS. And I am also aware
of one or two horror stories relating to recent or current treatment.
It should be emphasised, however, that such things are </span></i><i><i>not
confined </i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">to the NHS.
Bad things happen in the private healthcare sector too. And in any
case, I’ve also heard of examples of excellent mental health
treatment within the NHS. </span></i>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Negative
attitudes and maltreatment in mental health settings were, of course,
deeply entrenched long before the creation of the NHS – if
anything, such things have improved (though not nearly enough) since
the 1940s when British government minister Aneurin Bevan set in
motion the events that led to the creation of this system of
healthcare.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">One
of Bevan’s assumptions was that free healthcare available to all
(funded through taxation) would lead to (a) an improvement in the
health of the nation, which would in turn lead to (b) the NHS being
able to ‘pay for itself’ as better health led to a more efficient
economy (healthy workers better contributing to a healthy economy).
Needless to say, this didn’t quite happen. The health of the
nation certainly improved, but the NHS did not ‘pay for itself’ –
as Geoffrey Wheatcroft, a columnist for </span></i><i><i>The
Guardian</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">, recently
<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/mar/13/mid-staffs-scandal-inevitable-bevan-nhs">pointed out</a>.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">But
whatever deficiencies may exist within the NHS, I want to say
something positive about my own recent experience of treatment. This
experience has included the very welcome opportunity making my own
choice with regard to treatment. This isn’t a </span></i><i><i>completely</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
positive story, but it is a </span></i><i><i>substantially</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
positive story.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">One
of the reasons why I’ve been silent on my blog during the early
part of this year is because I was given some unexpected news on the
final day of last year.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">On
31 December 2012 I had an appointment with a urology consultant at
Worthing Hospital in West Sussex. I was expecting some
‘inconvenient’ news, but not anything especially bad. However,
the consultant told me that I had cancer. It was prostate cancer.
At the time I was surprised rather than shocked – not having yet
hit 50 I thought I was a bit too youthful for that sort of thing!
The fact that I didn’t react with panic on that occasion may have
something to do with the consultant’s rather quaint and reassuring
turn of phrase. That’s a good thing!</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Over
the following weeks I had various scans and tests before learning
that my best option was surgery, which in this case meant radical
prostatectomy (surgical removal of the prostate). </span></i>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Less
than a month after I was given my cancer diagnosis I met my
prospective surgeon. He carefully described the procedure and what I
should expect in terms of recovery, and then he patiently answered
all my questions.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Since
the beginning of this year, every one of the staff members I’ve
encountered at Worthing Hospital – consultants, registrar, surgeon,
specialist urology nurse, other nurses, counsellor, etc. – has
trea</span></i><span style="font-style: normal;">ted</span><i><span style="font-style: normal;"> me with professionalism and courtesy. I have experienced
care of the highest standard.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Unfortunately,
the surgery I need is not undertaken at Worthing. I was told I would
have to go to another hospital, some 50 miles away, for the actual
procedure. I won’t name the hospital where the surgery was to take
place because it does not come up to the same high standard I’ve
witnessed at Worthing (I’ve already said that this is a
</span></i><i><i>substantially</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
positive story, not a </span></i><i><i>completely</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
positive one). </span></i>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">I
attended a preoperative assessment at the hospital in question. I
won’t go into too many of the unpleasant or off-putting details,
but I will just say that I never expected to be sent home with a
blank consent form to sign! (That’s the yellow CON 1 form for
anyone who’s interested.) Needless to say, I came away determined
that I would not sign away my consent on a form which had not been
filled in. In fact, I was determined </span></i><i><i>not to be
operated on at that particular hospital</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">The
following day I did a bit of hasty research (clearly this is
something that I should have done earlier!) and identified another
hospital and surgeon, both with excellent reputations (not that I had
any objection to my original surgeon). I then tried to see if my own
GP (General Practitioner) would be willing to refer me to the
hospital and surgeon of my choice. That referral has now been made
with no difficulty whatsoever.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">At
present this story doesn’t have an end. But it does have a
message. The NHS provides free treatment to UK citizens at the point
of delivery. In many countries a cancer patient would be reliant on
private insurance to pay for a radical prostatectomy. With the best
surgeons at the best hospitals charging thousands more than their
less experienced and less well-regarded counterparts, it’s easy to
see where many insurance providers would steer their policy holders.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Like
any very large institution, the NHS it has its dark corners. But
there is also light. This will be no comfort for those who have </span></i><i><i>not</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
received the best treatment, those who have lost loved ones to poor
treatment, and especially to those who have done so without realising
there was a possibility of choice (at least in some cases). But for
those </span></i><i><i>yet to need</i></i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">
treatment, this could well be an encouragement. </span></i>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">While
my operation will now be delayed a little – due to my ‘eleventh
hour’ exercise of choice – I now know that I will undergo the
procedure at a centre of excellence performed by one of the best
surgeons. This is a true privilege for which I am very grateful.</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">____________
</span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Delivered
Unto Lions</i></span> <span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">by David
Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">ISBN
978-1-906628-21-5</span></div>
<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">For
more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></span></span></div>
David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-86973042075024175002012-12-20T13:20:00.000+00:002012-12-20T13:23:38.880+00:00<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Stepping into Rivers</span></div>
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">To<span style="font-size: small;"> </span>say that everything changes would hardly be an original comment. The
Greek philosopher <span lang="en">Heraclitus (circa 535-475
BC) supposedly said, ‘</span><span lang="en"><span style="font-weight: normal;">No
man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river
and he’s not the same man.’ He also said much the same thing in
another way: ‘Everything flows, nothing stands still.’</span></span></span></span>
<br />
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">One of
the biggest concerns and controversies of our time is the issue of
climate change. As I understand it, there is an almost universal
concensus among scientists (in the relevant fields) that climate
change is happening and that it is caused by human activity – the
burning of fossel fuels to bring much needed energy to our modern
human societies is leading to massive environmental destruction
brought about by ‘global warming’.
</span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">There
are, of course, those who deny this, those who simply </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">do
not believe</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
what the majority of climate change scientists tell us. Many of
these people are willing to accept that climate change is indeed
taking place, but they deny that it has a human cause. After all,
some of them say, our planet has a history of climate change dating
back long before human beings walked the earth. </span></span></span>
</div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">I
started this piece by quoting a philosopher, and I’m very tempted
to carry on in a philosophical vein by talking about a branch of
philosophy called ‘epistemology’ (that’s a good word to slip
into any conversation!). Epistemology is to do with the theory of
knowledge. It asks, How do we know what we know? For those of us
who are convinced that climate change is indeed caused by human
beings, the obvious question is, How do we </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">know</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">?
The same question applies to those of us who are just as convinced
that climate change does </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">not
</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">have
a human cause. How do we </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">know</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">?</span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">If you
are a scientist who specialises in climage change, you can make
careful observations, compare them, and then try to develop a theory.
You can then test that theory by making further observations to see
if there’s anything happening that might prove it wrong. But if
you continue to observe the same patterns repeatedly with no
exceptions (if you establish an ‘empirical regularity’), then you
can be pretty sure that your theory is right.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">But,
there is a problem. Did you do all this work on your own? Did you
conduct all the observations yourself? Did you do all the analysis
of these observations yourself? Or did you have to rely to some
extent on work undertaken by other scientists or technicians, work
that you weren’t in a position to supervise personally? If it’s
the latter, then you only know what you know because you are
convinced by the work of other people. And that is the same for all
of us. In most cases, we only know what we know because we are
convinced by what other people have told us. We are not always (or
even usually) able to test things out for ourselves.</span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">For
what it’s worth, I am convinced that the changes currently taking
place in the world’s climate are </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">indeed
a reality</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
and that human behaviour </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">is</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
responsible. But how do I </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">know</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">?
That fact is, I </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">don’t</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
know, I’m just sufficiently persuaded to accept what a </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">particular
kind</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
of authoritative figure tells me. (I also think it’s not worth
taking a chance over something so potentially catastrophic.) For
someone who denies climate change, the situation is pretty much the
same. The denier doesn’t actually </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">know</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
that climate change is false, he or she just happens to be persuaded
by the arguments of a </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">different
kind</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
of authoritative figure.</span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">But,
as Hereclitus said, ‘No man ever steps in the same river twice, for
it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.’ Hereclitus
knew this (I assume) because he had experienced or observed it (or
something similar) for himself. ‘And this I knew experimentally,’
said the seventeenth century figure George Fox. He was speaking of
personal religious ‘revelation’ (not the sort of thing you can
prove to anyone else), and he knew what he knew ‘experimentally’.
Like Hereclitus (so I assume), Fox was convinced by something
because he had experienced or observed it for himself; he was not
convinced because someone else had told him what to believe.</span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">In
fact, we </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">all</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
</span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">know</span></span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
about change ‘experimentally’ (or so I’m told!). We may not
know very much about </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">climate</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
change – apart from seasonal variations – but we </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">do</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">
know about change </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">in
general</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">.
Change happens. It’s reliable. We know this </span></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="font-weight: normal;">experimentally</span></i></span><span lang="en" style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">.</span></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div lang="en" style="font-weight: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Given
the often difficult subject matter I try to address in my writing, I
find it very encouraging that the one thing that we can all rely on
is change: some things may deteriorate and get worse, but there are
many things that can develop and improve.</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________
</span></span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered
Unto Lions</i></span><span style="font-size: small;"> by David
Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN
978-1-906628-21-5</span></span></div>
<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">For
more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></span></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-28745045818751682372012-12-07T14:22:00.000+00:002012-12-21T12:20:07.657+00:00<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;">Asylums, Antiquarians and Anecdotes - and Arthur C Clarke</span></div>
<br />
<br />
It’s no secret that my book <i>Delivered
Unto Lions</i>, though presented in the form of a novel, is closely
based on events that took place at a former mental institution in
Somerset called Merrifield. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merrifield_Children%27s_Unit">Merrifield Children’s Unit</a> was, if you
like, the partially detached young patients’ arm of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_Vale_Hospital">Tone Vale Hospital</a>, an old asylum-style institution. Both Merrifield and Tone
Vale were closed in the mid-1990s following the rise of ‘Care in
the Community’.
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Within two years of the closure of Tone
Vale, editors David Hinton and Fred Clarke compiled a slim volume
chronicling some of the hospital’s history. <i>The Tone Vale
Story: A Century Of Care</i> is the kind of publication you might
expect from a local history society, i.e. competently-researched,
slightly antiquarian in flavour, and presented with the keen
initiative of local history enthusiasts.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Some readers will be familiar, by
association, with co-editor Fred Clarke. His brother was the science
fiction author Arthur C Clarke. Indeed, <i>The Tone Vale Story</i>
is published by the Clarke family’s own organisation, the Rocket
Publishing Company. </div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkhmKvk283KKHZw-jOOfSZrS8CC6jdiWZQjePeUlMT4J5_Eo7QxtVm7H2NZV86wJ-QWvsYUnNu-ZOHMmLTwD3b2TQaCYDHmhV9ONtLr15x9-3lcsKE5XWyoaQfHgKRvbzc6CVwF4z8N5Q/s1600/The+Tone+Vale+Story_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkhmKvk283KKHZw-jOOfSZrS8CC6jdiWZQjePeUlMT4J5_Eo7QxtVm7H2NZV86wJ-QWvsYUnNu-ZOHMmLTwD3b2TQaCYDHmhV9ONtLr15x9-3lcsKE5XWyoaQfHgKRvbzc6CVwF4z8N5Q/s320/The+Tone+Vale+Story_1.jpg" width="229" /></a></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i>The Tone Vale Story</i> covers the
opening of the asylum in 1887, various key figures associated with
the development and running of the place, and architectural and
topographic observations, many of these being illustrated by vintage
photographs.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Of particular interest from my point of
view are a few paragraphs dedicated to Merrifield:</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm; margin-right: 11.99mm;">
Tone Vale and the Somerset Educational Authority combined to provide
a children’s unit for autistic and other emotionally disturbed
children in the grounds of Tone Vale: the Unit served the whole of
the South West of England …</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm; margin-right: 11.99mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm; margin-right: 11.99mm;">
Some of the children, although highly disturbed, were extremely well
read and educated. A local author, when invited to lecture to them,
found that one or two knew nearly as much about his subject, science
fiction, as he did!</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm; margin-right: 11.99mm;">
<br /></div>
<div align="RIGHT" style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm; margin-right: 11.99mm;">
(Hinton & Clarke, 1997, p. 43)</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
It is, perhaps, too easy to take issue
with parts of this. Firstly, the phrase ‘autistic and other
emotionally disturbed children’ is misleading, as autism is a
neurological condition, so it gives entirely the wrong impression to
then add ‘<i>and other</i> emotionally disturbed children’.
Secondly, labelling all Merrifield patients as ‘highly disturbed’
seems to unjustly brand young people who, in reality, were suffering
problems of <i>varying severity </i><span style="font-style: normal;">covering
a </span><i>broad range</i> of emotional, psychological and
neurological conditions.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
The local author who made these
observations, I happen to know, was actually Fred Clarke himself. I
know this because I was there! In the Spring of 1979, when I was 15,
he came to address a group of patients and staff about the work of
his more famous brother.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Putting my criticisms to one side, I
remember Fred Clarke’s visit with fondness – he was a genuinely
pleasant man. I particularly remember him showing us the handwritten
manuscript for Arthur C Clarke’s first novel, <i>The Sands of Mars.</i><span style="font-style: normal;">
My girlfriend of the time (don’t tell anyone I had a girlfriend –
it wasn’t allowed at Merrifield!) commented on the neatness of the
handwriting. Fred, however, in an entertaining brotherly way,
dismissed Arthur’s handwriting as an untidy scrawl!</span></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
As a result of that
occasion, I was invited by Fred to meet his highly-renowned brother
in the August of ’79. It was a slightly bizarre occasion which
took place at the Clarke family house (which was very close to Tone
Vale and Merrifield).
</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-style: normal;">The
well-known author was in the UK (he was based in Sri Lanka) to
promote his new television series </span><i>Arthur C Clarke’s
Mysterious World</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, and a Dutch
film crew had been at the house to interview him – and I got to
enjoy some of the catering! After the film crew had left, I found
myself in the peculiar position of sitting with Arthur C Clarke as he
watched an edition of the children’s TV programme </span><i>Blue
Peter </i><span style="font-style: normal;">(he particularly wanted to
see a feature on the Egyptian pyramids). I also took the opportunity
to take a photograph of Arthur, and he helpfully pointed out that you
should always take more than one shot when photographing something
important!</span></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
It is, however, the
less well-known of the two brothers who made the biggest impact on
me. I remember Fred Clarke as a gentle, courteous man who shared his
brother’s enthusiasm for both science and science fiction. And
when I met Fred again, twenty-two years later, at the 2001 Nexus
Convention in Bristol, I was surprised to discover that he remembered
me.</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-style: normal;">Against
this background I find myself surveying </span><i>The Tone Vale
Story</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, which Fred co-edited,
from a very particular perspective. I knew Fred Clarke to some
extent; I knew Tone Vale to some extent; and I knew Merrifield
intimately. So what does </span><i>The Tone Vale Story</i><span style="font-style: normal;">
mean in relation to unpleasant portrayals of Tone Vale and Merrifield
(or their novelised counterparts) in books like Joyce Passmore’s
mémoire </span><i>The Light in My Mind </i><span style="font-style: normal;">and
my own novel </span><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i><span style="font-style: normal;">?
</span>
</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i>The Tone Vale Story</i><span style="font-style: normal;">
is very matter-of-fact in its historical/antiquarian tone. The only
controversies it comes close to acknowledging are those associated
with past attitudes to mental health, such as those encapsulated in
the 1890 Lunacy Act. It tells the story of the institution in terms
of developments and innovations, coupled with a few folksy
recollections, but it does not tell the story of the institution in
terms of patients’ </span><i>experience</i><span style="font-style: normal;">.</span></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
No doubt there are
many former patients, both adult and child, who passed through Tone
Vale or Merrifield helped rather than harmed by the experience. But
there is enough personal testimony around to know that many
individuals – who were already experiencing problematic conditions
to one extent or another – were damaged further by their unsavoury
experiences of these closely linked institutions.
</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
But this reality is
not acknowledged in <i>The Tone Vale Story</i>. No doubt this is
because the source materials used by the book’s compilers make no
reference to such matters. Instead we find in the book an almost
celebratory appreciation of achievements and milestones:</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<ul>
<li><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Dr Henry
Aveline, the first Medical Superintendent of the asylum, is revered
for his multi-lingual ability</div>
</li>
<li><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Dr Kenneth
Bailey, a later Medical Superintendent, is almost canonised for
developing more humane approaches to mental illness</div>
</li>
<li><div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Ernest George
Stephens, Head Gardener, is highly commended for his ‘adventurous’
development of the hospital grounds</div>
</li>
</ul>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
This is all well
and good; achievements <i>should</i> be celebrated. But what of the
darker side? Were editors David Hinton and Fred Clarke even aware
that there was a darker side?</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Fred Clarke
certainly had some interaction with the on-site authorities at
Merrifield and with some of the patients (including myself), but it
seems to me to be entirely likely that, despite his close proximity
to disturbing events, he knew nothing of these things. I wonder how
many other visitors to Merrifield – NHS and local government
officials, chaplains and other supportive individuals, etc. –
remained unaware of some of the damaging things that happened from
time-to-time in an institution they knew relatively well.
</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
I’ve always
maintained that the phenomenon of Merrifield was one kept hidden from
public knowledge. Tone Vale Hospital was less well concealed, but
still there was much that was kept hidden. Even for those who might
have thought they knew these places – because at some point they
had stepped foot inside – the full truth still remained hidden.</div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
This leads me to
wonder how many other local histories and modern antiquarian writings
unwittingly keep their readers out of the hidden recesses. Perhaps
the unpleasant anecdote (as well as the pleasant one) deserves some
space alongside the historical or antiquarian record.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">____________
</span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>The
Tone Vale Story: A Century Of Care</i></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-style: normal;">,
edited by David Hinton & Fred Clarke, i</span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">s
published by the Rocket Publishing Co.</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">ISBN
978-1-899995-05-9</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Delivered
Unto Lions</i></span> <span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">by David
Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">ISBN
978-1-906628-21-5</span></div>
<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="font-style: normal; margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">For
more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></div>
David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-26029092737897986012012-12-03T09:27:00.000+00:002012-12-03T09:50:44.611+00:00<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">When Childhood Ends</span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
The rain on the pavements
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
From a crack in
the sky</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
The watery
remnants
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
Of how you once
cried</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
It drains through
your being</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
Like the death of
a friend</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
And I think
you’ll find your childhood must end</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
I wrote those words more than
twenty-five years ago. I was a young man then, still in my early
twenties. To be honest, I’ve slightly changed one line as I
decided my original attempt wasn’t good enough. I’m not sure
that <i>any </i>of it’s particularly good anyway – including the
melody I wrote for it (it’s a song) – but this is it, for what
it’s worth.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
There was a particular incident that
prompted me to write those words. A work colleague of mine (a little
older than me, but still a young man) had recently left our employer
and taken up another position – his dream job! – elsewhere in the
country. A few weeks after he left, the message came back that he
had suffered a severe head injury in a road accident. I can’t
remember for certain, but I think he may have been a pedestrian
rather than a car-driver or passenger.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Over the coming days and weeks reports
continued to filter back about his condition. Eventually the news
came that he had died.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
I’m sorry to say I can’t remember
his name – this wasn’t quite the ‘death of a friend’ that I
wrote about in my song. The truth is, this man hadn’t been an
especially close friend of mine, but he <i>had</i> been a friendly,
likeable colleague. Other colleagues of mine who had known him
better and for longer were, of course, devastated.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
This left me with the luxury – if you
can call it a luxury – of being able to step back and reflect on
what had happened in a way that the more deeply bereaved couldn’t.
And so I thought about how a man of a similar age to myself had moved
away to follow the career he wanted. This was a very positive thing,
something to be celebrated. But in what seemed like no time at all,
it was all over. He only got to experience his dream for a short
time before his life came to a tragic end, his last few weeks lived
in unconsciousness.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
While pondering all this, I also
thought of another young man I knew who had died a few years earlier
(he had been slightly younger than me). His name was Chris. He was
still in his teens when he lost his life to <span style="font-style: normal;">m</span><em><span style="font-style: normal;">eningitis.
</span></em>Again, he wasn’t an especially close friend of mine,
but he was a friend nonetheless (we went to the same youth club). <em><span style="font-style: normal;">
Chris had been on my mind when I wrote some earlier verses – </span></em>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
<em><span style="font-style: normal;">Frozen
water</span></em></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
<em><span style="font-style: normal;">Iced
out, glassed out</span></em></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; margin-left: 11.99mm;">
<em><span style="font-style: normal;">Has
melted, washed away</span></em></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<em>– <span style="font-style: normal;">but
he was still on my mind when I wrote the words about ‘rain on the
pavements’ and ‘a crack in the sky’.</span></em></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<em><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;">Is
there a point to all this gloomy recollection? Well, yes. I think the
point is that, one way or another, childhood and youth come to an
end. Innocence of endings comes to an end. Such things
can come to an end in sudden tragedy or they can just slip away
gradually, almost unnoticed. Adulthood, if it is achieved, also comes
to an end.</span></span></em><em><span style="font-style: normal;"> </span></em>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<em><span style="font-style: normal;">But
a legacy remains from anything that comes to an end. For those of us
who still live, legacies remain a part of our personal existence; for
those of us who no longer live, legacies remain for others. </span></em>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<em><span style="font-style: normal;">Given
that endings cannot be avoided, maybe we should work harder to make
those legacies good ones – challenging though that may be. Perhaps
we can work towards discovering the childhood happiness that wasn’t
known in life, while also celebrating and maintaining something of
the childhood happiness that was.</span></em></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">____________
</span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Delivered
Unto Lions</i></span> <span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">by David
Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">ISBN
978-1-906628-21-5</span></div>
<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">For
more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
</div>
David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-43555495728775084202012-11-29T11:53:00.000+00:002012-11-29T11:57:08.728+00:00<div align="CENTER" style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Telling Stories,
Singing Songs, and Ways to Live Forever</span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br />
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
In October 2012 (just a few weeks ago,
at time of writing), my wife, two daughters and I attended a weekend
course on Storytelling for 8-12 Year Olds at the <a href="http://www.woodbrooke.org.uk/">Woodbrooke Quaker Study Centre</a> in Birmingham. It was a packed programme involving story
creation, storytelling, dramatic improvisation and much more.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
One of the events we enjoyed took place
in the grounds of Woodbrooke. We all gathered round a camp fire
after dark and sang songs. One song I’d never come across before
involved the popular character of Harry Potter. It went to the tune
of <i>Frère Jacques</i><i><span style="font-style: normal;">:</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; text-align: left;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Harry
Potter, Harry Potter</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; text-align: left;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Where’s
he gone? Where’s he gone?</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; text-align: left;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Run
of with Hermione, run of with Hermione</span></i></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; text-align: left;">
<i><span style="font-style: normal;">Poor
old Ron! Poor old Ron!</span></i></div>
</blockquote>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
With all due apologies to <a href="http://www.jkrowling.co.uk/">J K Rowling</a>, it was great to come away from a Quaker
establishment with that particular gem!</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
One of the leaders of this weekend
storytelling course was the children’s author <a href="http://www.sallynicholls.com/">Sally Nicholls</a>. After
we returned home we bought a copy of her book <i>Ways To Live Forever
</i>for our eldest daughter. A few days ago, I picked it up and read
it myself.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Although <i>Ways To Live Forever</i> is
primarily intended for children and teenagers, its direct and
unashamedly open language make it a very worthwhile read for adults
too.
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Sally Nicholls addresses a very
difficult subject in this book – a child’s terminal illness –
but she overcomes adult fears and reticence by using the frank,
matter-of-fact voice of the afflicted child. The main character of the book is Sam, an 11-year-old with <span class="st">leukaemia, and the story is told entirely from his perspective. </span> Through an engaging
first person narrative this book explores important questions: What
are the priorities for a child who knows he doesn’t have long to
live? How does he perceive the actions and conversations of the
adults around him? In exploring questions like these the book draws
the reader into that child’s world.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
Obviously, this is not a happy,
feel-good book, but that’s not to say that it’s entirely bleak
and grim. There is gentle humour scattered throughout the story, and
this helps lead the reader towards the (inevitable) conclusion.
Essentially, in my view, this book conveys the message that tragedy
of this kind cannot be swept away and ignored, but by ‘normalising’
it through the eyes of a child, it is shown as something that can be
faced (just about). Nothing here is trivialised, it is simply
expressed as normal for those experiencing it.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<i>Ways To Live Forever</i> is a
fantastic book, and one whose honesty will be especially appreciated
by young readers.</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
So, the learning experience of the
storytelling course and an entertaining song about Harry Potter weren’t the only
things I took away from our family weekend at Woodbrooke!</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">____________
</span>
</div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Ways
To Live Forever </i></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">by
Sally Nichols is published by Scholastic</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">ISBN
978-1-407130-50-7</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Delivered
Unto Lions</i></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"> by David
Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0mm;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">ISBN
978-1-906628-21-5</span></div>
David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-13509501505787455162012-03-12T11:46:00.001+00:002012-03-12T11:57:36.143+00:00A Spiritual Dimension?<style type="text/css">
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<div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">In thinking about mental health – or, indeed, health in general – is there a spiritual dimension that needs to be considered?</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">Talk of ‘spirit’ or ‘spirituality’ is a big turn-off for many thinking people these days. Here in the UK where secular and atheist attitudes seem to be on the rise (not that secular and atheist are necessarily the same thing), matters of spirit get cast aside as </span><span style="font-size: small;">vague,</span><span style="font-size: small;"> unverifiable, or even non-existent.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">I make no secret of the fact that I was brought up in a Christian tradition, and I remain a person of faith (though no longer affiliated to exactly the same tradition in which I was raised). But I am also the kind of person who asks questions. Just because someone in a position of authority (religious of otherwise) says something, doesn’t necessarily mean I will accept it.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">The point is, however, that I draw on my particular background in trying to understand and make a case for the spiritual. In doing this, what strikes me is how <i>ordinary</i> and <i>natural</i> the spiritual is. The Hebrew word <i>ruha</i> and the Greek word <i>pneuma</i> – used in the Old and New Testaments of the Bible respectively – are both translated into English as ‘spirit’. The words <i>ruha</i> and <i>pneuma</i> are both about ‘breath’ or ‘wind’, they are about ‘motivating force’, about the ‘engine’ that ‘drives’ us – or ‘drives’ <i>any</i> living thing. You don’t have to be religious to recognise that life has – and <i>is</i> – a kind of energy.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">So, spirituality is about the ‘stuff’ that drives us, that motives us, that keeps us moving. But where there are problems with mental health, we can see that something about the spirit of a person is inhibited or threatened (in a less enlightened age we might have said that such a person was 'possessed' by an <i>bad</i> spirit!). Indeed, in any area of human life where we see things going wrong – relationships falling apart, violent competition taking over, etc. – we can see that something about the spiritual has become disordered, that it isn’t working properly. A person's spiritual motivation becomes diseased – i.e. dis-eased, not at ease.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">In thinking about a spiritual dimension to health, we are thinking about finding ways to make the human spirit more ‘at ease’ in order to bring about helpful improvements. This could mean different things for different people, but I would suggest that <i>everyone </i>might well benefit from taking the spiritual more seriously – the spirit (that ‘engine of life’) needs to be nurtured rather than ignored.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">We live in a world that likes to find mechanistic solutions to mechanistic problems. If someone has a mental health problem, very often we look for a fault in the ‘mechanism’ of the mind or brain and then try to fix it, either with drugs or with other therapies (sometimes we don't even look for the fault, we just assume it's there). I’m generalising, of course – mental health workers would quite rightly be annoyed at my simple stereotype of their work! But the spirit is about <i>more</i> than than that – it's about the <i>whole</i> self, the <i>whole</i> human race, and the <i>whole</i> of life all together: the spirit <i>is</i> life.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">I would suggest, therefore – and you are free to dismiss this if you think I’m talking nonsense! – that we should all work on developing the spiritual for the sake of ourselves and for the sake of one another. We may each do this in different ways using different forms of private meditation and/or collective sharing (or whatever you may call particular activities that have the same basic qualities).</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">For the sceptics – and I could so easily be one of them – I must add that I’m not trying to sell anyone a miracle. I am merely suggesting that there is indeed a spiritual dimension and that acknowledging it (working with it, not against it) might be helpful.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________ </span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press (Paperback and eBook)</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-size: small;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0mm; orphans: 0; widows: 0;"><br />
</div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-21468152237583222212012-03-02T10:47:00.002+00:002012-03-02T10:52:22.129+00:00A Beneficial 'Prescription' For Improving Emotional Well-BeingMattheiu Ricard's book <i>The Art Of Happiness</i> (published by Atlantic) is a volume I would recommend very highly. It needs a bit of self-discipline to work through it — it isn’t a casual read — but it is well worth making the effort. <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41162YhuQML._SS500_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41162YhuQML._SS500_.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>The author is a Buddhist monk with an academic background in genetics. More recently, he has conducted research into the neurological effects of meditation. Meditation is, indeed, very much commended in this book, and the author draws on both the natural sciences and Buddhist tradition to present an approach for increasing your 'happiness skills'. It’s probably worth mentioning that the British quality press has described Mattheiw Ricard as '<a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/the-happiest-man-in-the-world-433063.html">the happiest man in the world</a>' (a claim prompted by results of an MRI scan of his left pre-frontal cortex). <br />
<br />
Some readers of a resolutely secular persuasion may find the idea of some Buddhist content off-putting, as may those of other religious traditions. In fact, the Buddhist content, though definitely present (and, in my view, of interest in itself), isn’t overly emphasised. The author does not attempt to indoctrinate the reader; essentially, he is offering a methodology — and a frequently effective one at that.<br />
<br />
This book is <i>not</i> a miracle cure for unhappiness, but it <i>is</i> a beneficial “prescription” for improving emotional well-being.<br />
____________ <br />
<br />
<i>The Art Of Happiness: A Guide To Developing Life's Most Important Skill</i> by Matthieu Ricard is published by Atlantic (Paperback)<br />
ISBN 978-1-59285-099-0<i><i><br />
<br />
<i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> </i></i>by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press (Paperback and eBook)<br />
ISBN 978-0-85789-273-7<br />
For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-82382885482906095652011-10-12T12:31:00.003+01:002011-10-12T14:07:14.441+01:00Psychological Disturbance - Part of Our Shared Human Condition<style type="text/css">
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<span style="font-family: Ariel,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small;">Broadcast journalist and weather presenter <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/weather/hi/about/newsid_8647000/8647336.stm">Reham Khan</a> (well-known to BBC viewers and listeners in the south of England) occasionally likes to present her friends, acquaintances and aficionados with interesting intellectual challenges. She recently posed the question, ‘Using drugs for entertainment or relaxation is a sign of a psychologically disturbed individual. Do you agree?’ She did, of course, receive a number of responses of various flavours. Though I am not professionally or personally qualified to answer her question, I made an attempt anyway! </span><br />
<div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">What interests me, though, is that Reham’s question taps into a whole range of assumptions. Her question has certainly made me aware of some of mine. Without thinking about it, I interpreted the term ‘psychologically disturbed’ in a negative light. I saw it as pejorative. To me, then, the question <i>appeared</i> to be asking whether recreational drug use was equated with some sort of personal moral shortcoming. Needless to say, Reham was not suggesting any such thing.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">It was only after I pondered the question again later that I realised my mistake. I had interpreted the expression ‘psychologically disturbed’ in a judgemental way. In my defence, however, I would like to say that I don’t think I’m alone in making this error. There is a very long social history of seeing psychological disturbance (however it is defined) in negative terms. Sufferers of its more problematic manifestations have often been placed in institutions as ‘punishment’ for their conditions, or they have received other forms of apparently punitive attention.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">What is especially disturbing today (psychologically or otherwise) is the quality of public discourse on the subject of these conditions. This has been prompted by current economic considerations. In the UK, where governmental agencies are seeking ways to reduce the cost of welfare, people with psychological disorders (and physical disorders) are finding that their claims for financial support are now being rejected. Where medical professionals used to assess the validity (or otherwise) of such claims, lower-paid administrative staff are now making the required judgements. If a claimant doesn’t use the exact words or phrases on the administrator’s check-list, his or her claim is rejected.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">Rejection is a consequence of judgement. For some people who have to live with very challenging conditions, the rejection of a claim for benefits can read like moral disapproval. In such cases, not only is psychological disturbance equated with failure, it isn’t even seen as a <i>worthy</i> failure. And this feeds into the perception given by the popular press, and adopted by some members of the public, that the psychologically disturbed are shirkers who want to get something for nothing (even where they happen to be economically active, but need their incomes supplemented due to special needs).</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">I am not suggesting that this is actually happening, but given the current public discourse surrounding psychological and mental health problems, it wouldn’t be at all surprising if some people did <i>indeed</i> turn to recreational drugs for entertainment or relaxation – after all, it’s not as though they would be judged any more harshly.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">Words are weapons, and I would suggest we need to change the words we use and the way we use them. The bigger challenge, though, is to change our attitudes. Psychological disturbance is <i>not</i> immoral, but it <i>is</i> very common. Let’s start treating it as part of our shared human condition, rather than as something to be condemned.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div align="CENTER" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">* * *</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">On another note, it is now one year since my book <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> was published in paperback. In celebration of this one-year anniversary, a new eBook edition is about to be published. More details on that to come. In the meantime, if you are a new visitor to my blog, <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> can be summarised as a factually-based novel inspired by my own experience as a child psychiatric in-patient in the 1970s. It is not just (a version of) my story, however, as it represents the terrible traumatic experiences of many children and teenagers caught up in the mental healthcare system as it was at that time.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________ </span> </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published in paperback by CheckPoint Press</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">eBook edition coming soon</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-10172874273596278972011-06-07T12:57:00.001+01:002011-06-07T14:13:45.970+01:00Book Review - Get Me Out Of Here<div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">It has taken me an incredibly long time to get round to reviewing this particular book. Rachel Reiland’s <i>Get Me Out Of Here</i> (published by Hazelden) is a very challenging read. And, at 447 pages, it is a <i>lengthy</i> challenge. Rachel seemingly leads us through every minute and nuanced detail of her arduous recovery from (what is still commonly referred to as) borderline personality disorder (BPD). It appears that she spares the reader very little, hence a page-count which invites especially committed participation in a very unsettling story.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41qja4qMoEL._SS500_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41qja4qMoEL._SS500_.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">By way of a brief introduction I will attempt to sketch out the basics of borderline personality disorder. Among the many symptoms associated with BDP are: fear of being abandoned, unstable and intense personal relationships, impulsive and sometimes reckless behaviour, suicidal behaviour, kneejerk changes in mood, and problems in controlling anger. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">There has been a definite stigma associated with BDP within health care services (with sufferers seen as ‘difficult’ or ‘attention seeking’, etc., due to their ‘faulty’ personalities). This is one of the reasons why there are currently moves to rename the condition; suggested alternative descriptions include ‘emotional dysregulation disorder’ and ‘post traumatic personality disorganisation’ (derived from the assumption that past trauma, especially in childhood, has caused the condition). Reiland’s book, however, does not deal with the controversies associated with the BDP diagnosis.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">A particular aspect of this book that does not sit comfortably with me is the way Rachel Reiland (not actually her real name) is so gushing in her praise of the health care services which assist in her recovery. She particularly singles out her therapist, Dr Padgett (presumably not his real name either), for almost unconditional acclaim. It would certainly appear that the services and practitioners are indeed <i>deserving</i> of credit – they have, after all, helped Rachel to overcome a seriously limiting condition and enabled her to live a much fuller life (in terms of both family and professional career). But it also seems to me that there are ways in which the care provided is less than helpful.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">Rachel’s periods as an in-patient in a psychiatric unit are especially unsettling. It is, in fact, a relatively common-place situation that leads to her initial admission: she succumbs to the stress of keeping house and caring for her demanding young children – essentially, she ‘loses it’. But the unit is hardly an understanding and compassionate environment. At one point, to relieve the boredom, Rachel ‘power walks’ around the unit while listening to her Walkman. A charge nurse, however, puts a stop to this, confiscating the Walkman and telling Rachel that she obviously can’t control herself. A second ‘power walking’ incident leads to Rachel being held in isolation in the ‘lockup’.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">The bulk of the book, however, focuses on the out-patient therapeutic relationship between Rachel and Dr Padgett. Padgett (the Medical Director of Psychiatry at the unit) offers Rachel very frequent psychoanalytic therapy sessions over a considerable period. Rachel exhibits alternating attitudes to Padgett; one minute she idolises him, and the next she loathes him (this is portrayed as classic BDP behaviour). But from the very start she appears to be unhealthily dependent on him, and he almost seems to encourage this dependence – not that she ever criticises him for that.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">As a reader involved in the unfolding story, I found myself increasingly ambivalent about Padgett. On the one hand, he is the key figure in Rachel’s recovery, the one who makes it all possible. But on the other, he comes over as the one calling the shots in an extremely unequal relationship. And, as this is in the context of American private health care, Rachel is <i>paying </i>to be the lesser participant in this situation. It seems to me that Padgett enables Rachel’s recovery, not by working in partnership with her, but by demanding that she yield to his will and superior status. On the occasions when Rachel becomes angry and unco-operative with Padgett, she appears to be <i>quite right</i> to react this way (though the scale of her reaction is usually excessive). </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Get Me Out Of Here</i> is, of course, a positive book. The fact is, Rachel <i>recovers</i>, and in doing so she offers hope to other sufferers of the same condition. I can’t help wondering, however, if she would have recovered just as well – if not better – if she’d had a therapist using a different and more collaborative approach. Rachel, however, is perfectly satisfied with the approach taken by Dr Padgett, and she, after all, is the one best placed to judge.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________ </span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Get Me Out Of Here: My Recovery From Borderline Personality Disorder </i>by Rachel Reiland is published by Hazelden</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-59285-099-0</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0mm;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/"><span style="color: blue;">www.davidaustin.eu</span></a></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 12pt;"></span></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-22976913671435487602011-04-26T11:58:00.001+01:002011-04-26T12:10:17.715+01:00Do Actions Speak Louder?<div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Actions speak louder than words, or so the saying goes. As someone who often spends far too much time thinking about such things, I sometimes find myself wondering if actions and words are really very different. Both are forms of communication which actually <i>do</i> things in the real world. If I pick up a hammer and drop it on your toe, that <i>does</i> something. If I then turn to you and say that you are a waste of space, and it’s your own fault that the hammer landed on your toe (because you were in the way), then that also does something.</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">We have intentions when we say things. We expect our words to achieve something. Indeed, there are many philosophers, sociolinguists, and other academics, who have put a good deal of effort into determining what words <i>do</i>, and <i>how</i> they do it. John L Austin, for example, is a name especially associated with speech-act theory. This theory emphasises various aspects of speech, and one of them is the actual effect that words have, whether it is the effect of persuading, inspiring, frightening, or making something else happen.</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">These observations are particularly relevant to me as the author of a book related to mental health care. In my writing (rather than speaking, in this case), there are (at least) three things that were going on. Firstly, there was the actual act of sitting down and writing, i.e. turning my memories and reflections into a novel. Secondly, there was the issue of what I intended my words to do, i.e. my aim of drawing attention (in an entertaining way, hopefully) to past institutional practices that I understood as unjust. And thirdly, there was the actual effect that my words had on the people who read them.</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">But what is probably far more interesting than any of that, is the use of words in mental health care itself. If we say that actions speak louder than words, we are in danger of ignoring just how powerful words are. One of the things I included in my book, <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i>, is a form of words I remember very well from my time as a teenage mental patient in the ’70s. That form of words went something like this: ‘You are not being punished; this is just a consequence of your actions.’ </div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Naming a disciplinary act as a ‘consequence’ rather than a ‘punishment’ was, no doubt, intended to <i>do</i> something. My guess is that it was an attempted form of behaviouralist conditioning – i.e. you already know the consequence of putting your hand in the fire is a painful burn, so therefore you don’t do it because of the inevitable result; in the same way, the consequence of (for instance) running away is confinement with all your clothing removed, so therefore you learn not to defy institutional authority, because that too has an inevitable result (or so you are conditioned to believe). Consequences, after all, are things that happen naturally, whereas punishments are deliberately imposed. </div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">It is also very interesting how people with mental health conditions get labelled, because, of course, labels are also words which <i>do</i> things. I’m currently reading a book which tells the story of someone’s experience of borderline personality disorder (which I will review here in due course). But the expression ‘borderline personality disorder’ itself represents a form of words with an effect. Some people see these words as having a <i>judgemental</i> effect, as they paint a picture of someone who’s very self (personality) is faulty, existing on a ‘borderline’ between ‘normal’ and ‘psychotic’ functioning. For this reason (among others), there are alternative words that have been suggested to describe this condition, such as ‘emotional instability disorder’ or ‘post traumatic personality disorganization’. As such, these alternative names <i>do</i> alternative things, whether good or bad.</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Stigma continues to be a major issue for current and recovered sufferers of mental health problems. The words we use can speak just as loudly as any actions. By their strength, words can feed the power of stigma, reinforce prejudice, and prolong suffering; or by their strength, words can <i>reduce</i> the power of stigma, <i>challenge</i> prejudice, and help <i>alleviate</i> suffering. Words, as well as actions, <i>do</i> things in the real world. Perhaps we should be more careful in the words we use so that we make sure they do the <i>right</i> things.</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"></div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">____________ </div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/"><span class="InternetLink">www.davidaustin.eu</span></a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-53147520046555511732011-03-21T10:25:00.004+00:002011-03-21T11:36:46.327+00:00Book Review - Winnicott<div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">D W Winnicott (1896-1971) was a pioneering paediatrician and psychoanalyst who dedicated his life to the field of child development. Adam Phillips’ book, <i>Winnicott </i>(published by Penguin), provides a thorough overview of the man’s life and achievements.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">I must admit that, until I picked up this book, I knew next to nothing about D W Winnicott. But Adam Phillips (himself a child psychotherapist) corrects that gap in my knowledge with this affectionate – though not uncritical – exploration of a very significant figure in the history of child psychiatry and psychology.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://images.bookdepository.co.uk/assets/images/book/large/9780/1410/9780141031507.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://images.bookdepository.co.uk/assets/images/book/large/9780/1410/9780141031507.jpg" width="297" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Phillips covers Winnicott’s early life, starting with his birth and upbringing in Devon, where he was raised in the non-conformist Wesleyan tradition. Phillips identifies this as noteworthy because Winnicott borrowed from the tradition’s eighteenth century founder, John Wesley, the desire to make his work accessible by using plain language – he did not believe that presenting his message in a popular way weakened it. But unlike Wesley, Winnicott rejected the aim of <i>converting</i> his audience, because he came to see it as a sign of madness to make such big demands on other people’s trust. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Given that Winnicott had a preference for plain language, it is regrettable that Phillips’ preface and fairly lengthy introduction are rather dry in style, which may put off more casual readers. Fortunately, his writing style is more easily manageable in the main body of the book (though in quoting the work of other thinkers, he isn’t afraid to repeat what some readers might see as ‘psychobabble’).</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">As Winnicott’s focus was always on child developmental issues, it is more than appropriate that Phillips considers not only the facts of Winnicott’s upbringing, but also Winnicott’s own view of it (as expressed in published comments). For instance, Phillips makes a point of comparing apparent characteristics of Winnocott’s father (e.g. as a potentially humiliating presence) with his son’s positive and justifying view of him. But while Winnicott’s comments on his father gained wide circulation, he published very little about his mother until he was in his late sixties, when he reflected on her suffering of depression. Phillips does not let the reader miss the possible correlation of such remembered experiences with the emphasis on the mother-and-child relationship in Winnicott’s professional work.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">Phillips places Winnicott’s activity within the context of psychoanalysis in general, as bequeathed to world by Sigmund Freud, and as subsequently applied in connection with children by the likes of Anna Freud and Melanie Klein in the late 1920s. Winnicott, while learning much from these practitioners of the late</span><span style="font-size: small;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small; line-height: 115%;">’20s</span><span style="font-size: small;">, also deviates from them, not least in the way he resists their rigid adherence to their (often opposing) dogmas.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">One particular chapter especially grabbed my attention. This is the one which looks at Winnicott’s observations about children evacuated from their homes during World War II. In this chapter, Phillips examines how these unfortunate (and damaging) circumstances gave Winnicott the opportunity to learn a great deal about children’s behaviour. It would not have been possible to make the same discoveries in peacetime, as it would obviously have been unethical to remove children from their homes and place them in hostels simply for the sake of research. What fascinates me personally is the parallel between these wartime experiences (and discoveries) and my own interest in the situation of children removed from their homes and placed in psychiatric units (in the post-war years up until the mid-1990s).</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Also of special interest for me, given how little I knew of Winnicott previously, is how familiar many of his ideas appear. For instance, he sees common childhood symptoms, not as evidence of disorders, but as part of a child’s expression of identity. Such symptoms, however, come to indicate disorders when they continue to be used despite being useless as forms of communication. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Phillips particularly refers to Winnicott’s example of bed-wetting. This may represent a child’s protest against overbearing control, in which case it cannot be considered a disorder. But if the bed-wetting fails to communicate that protest effectively, but carries on anyway, then it should indeed be regarded as disordered. So, it is the <i>context </i>of a symptom that determines whether or not there is a problem. Many parents will be familiar with (and sometimes sceptical of) ideas of this kind from child rearing self-help books and parenting ‘experts’ (health visitors, TV child care ‘gurus’, etc.).</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">For me, this book is a useful introduction to D W Winnicott and his work. The author has succeeded in bringing his subject to life on the page, revealing a good deal about Winnicott’s possible motivations, hopes and aims. Given how empathetic and caring a figure Winnicott appears to have been, it is perhaps disappointing that these aspects of his approach were less influential in children’s post-war mental health care than were his theoretical contributions. </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">____________ </div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><i>Winnicott</i> by Adam Phillips is published by Penguin</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">ISBN 978-0-141-03150-7</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-75918564345394319092011-03-14T11:16:00.002+00:002011-03-14T11:27:25.070+00:00Thoughts and Concerns<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Over the past few months I have written a good deal on subjects that, either directly or indirectly, relate to some form of human suffering in connection with mental health. My main concern has been with the past suffering of children and adolescents – most of whom have hopefully survived into adulthood – who spent some (or all) of their formative years in residential psychiatric care. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">From the age of twelve to seventeen, I myself spend some considerable time in a children’s psychiatric unit (it wasn’t a single continuous stay, but it certainly dominated that part of my life). It was a very unpleasant experience, but I freely acknowledge that I was very fortunate compared to some of the other young people I knew during that time. Back then (from early 1976 to late 1980) I witnessed a good deal of mental distress in others that put my own difficulties into perspective.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">Needless to say, in that situation, much of the suffering in question was directly caused by the very reason for admission to a psychiatric unit in the first place. Those young mental patients suffered with a variety of problems, from depression to eating disorders, from neuroses to psychoses. But there was <i>additional</i> suffering for some of those kids. This was the result of separation from, or rejection by, their families, plus occasionally punitive and unjust treatment at the unit. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">But there is another kind of suffering on my mind as I write this. The people of Japan are very much in my thoughts at the moment, as that country was hit by a devastating earthquake on Friday, 11 March 2011. Today, the following Monday, the scale of human suffering in the wake of that event is becoming more and more difficult to take in. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">How are we to deal with the issue of human suffering? How are we to compare suffering on a relatively small scale, such as that experienced in a 1970s children’s unit, with that on a much larger scale? </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">This question reminded me of something I read in an introductory theology text a number of years ago. I had a rummage on my book shelves to see if I still had it, and if I could find the passage I remembered (and if I had remembered it correctly). As it happened, I was able to find it quite quickly, and so I will quote what I found:</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0mm 34pt 0.0001pt;"></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0mm 34pt 0.0001pt;">Some [people] are appalled by the total, vast extent of evil and suffering. It is true, of course, that no one person can <i>experience</i> it all. If twenty thousand people suffer and die from cancer of the lung there is no one person who can suffer more than his own individual share of pain. No one can die twenty thousand deaths. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0mm 34pt 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div align="right" class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0mm 34pt 0.0001pt; text-align: right;"> (John Stacey, 1977/1984, Groundwork of Theology, p. 98)</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">The reason I bring this up is because it deals with perspective, and also because I believe <i>all</i> suffering matters. It may be one person’s suffering, or it may be <i>thousands</i> of people’s suffering. Recovery may take place in just a few days, or it may take <i>years</i> (or, very sadly, recovery may be impossible). The point is that suffering is still a tragedy, no matter what the scale. This is not a competition. If you’ve been hurt or damaged, then that <i>still</i> matters, and working towards a better future for yourself and those close to you is important. There may be others who are suffering more, and you can empathise with them and help them if you can; but that does not devalue <i>your</i> experience.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My thoughts are very much with the people of Japan, but they also continue to be with those young people I once knew all those years ago. If the thought can translate into practical attention (however small), and if concern can translate into hope (however small), then I'm sure those thoughts and concerns are worth having. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">____________ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-19532215493618661022011-03-07T09:47:00.000+00:002011-03-07T09:47:04.092+00:00Book Review - Me, Myself, and Them<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:RelyOnVML/> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-GB</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:SplitPgBreakAndParaMark/> <w:DontVertAlignCellWithSp/> <w:DontBreakConstrainedForcedTables/> <w:DontVertAlignInTxbx/> <w:Word11KerningPairs/> <w:CachedColBalance/> <w:UseFELayout/> </w:Compatibility> <w:DoNotOptimizeForBrowser/> <m:mathPr> <m:mathFont m:val="Cambria Math"/> <m:brkBin m:val="before"/> <m:brkBinSub m:val="--"/> <m:smallFrac m:val="off"/> <m:dispDef/> <m:lMargin m:val="0"/> <m:rMargin m:val="0"/> <m:defJc m:val="centerGroup"/> <m:wrapIndent m:val="1440"/> <m:intLim m:val="subSup"/> <m:naryLim m:val="undOvr"/> </m:mathPr></w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" DefUnhideWhenUsed="true"
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</style> <![endif]--> <div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>Having read one perspective on schizophrenia, in <i>Henry’s Demons</i> by Patrick and Henry Cockburn, I decided to investigate another point-of-view, and one that particularly made reference to childhood and adolescence (though onset of schizophrenia in childhood or early adolescence is comparatively rare).<span> </span>And so I found myself reading <i>Me, Myself, and Them</i> by Kurt Snyder (published by Oxford University Press).</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><i>Me, Myself, and Them</i><span> is Kurt Snyder’s own account of living with schizophrenia, an experience that began for him at the age of 18.<span> </span>But his account is supplemented by observations from an academic in the field of psychiatry, neurology and radiology (Raquel E Gur) and a journalist specialising in mental health issues (Linda Wasmer Andrews).</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>Kurt looks back to his childhood, and although he identifies two unfortunate incidents which overly preoccupied him for some considerable time, it seems he was a relatively happy, if reserved, child.<span> </span>It was at the age of 18, shortly after having begun an engineering degree course, that symptoms of schizophrenia emerged.<span> </span></span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>He started to believe he was a genius on the verge of a major breakthrough in mathematics, but the breakthrough eluded him, and so he began to feel he simply wasn’t thinking hard enough.<span> </span>But he also became forgetful, disorganised, and very paranoid.<span> </span>Not surprisingly, his college work suffered.<span> </span></span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>Kurt’s symptoms intensified after dropping out of college and pursing work in general maintenance.<span> </span>As he tells his story, the reader is allowed into his world of fear, where hostility appears to lurk behind every corner, and where he believes his every movement is being watched.<span> </span>And these symptoms are contextualised in a useful overview of the different varieties and manifestations of schizophrenia.<span> </span></span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>It is hard to find anything much to criticise in this book.<span> </span>If I have one very minor criticism, it is that more hasn’t been done to address the issues of stigma and stereotyping in connection with schizophrenia.<span> </span>These issues are <i>not</i> ignored, but they are dealt with rather fleetingly towards the end of the book.<span> </span>My own feeling is that these are very important matters that should have been raised earlier, and dealt with more thoroughly.<span> </span></span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://images.bookdepository.co.uk/assets/images/book/large/9780/1953/9780195311228.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://images.bookdepository.co.uk/assets/images/book/large/9780/1953/9780195311228.jpg" width="297" /></a></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>There are two major benefits to this book, as I see it.<span> </span>First, it mixes personal experience with explanatory detail in a very readable way.<span> </span>Some of the background observations tend towards the technical, but they are offered in a straightforward and readily understandable way.<span> </span>The book also offers some guidance on legal and financial matters (for sufferers in the United States), thus adding another dimension to its more practical aspects.<span> </span>This book strikes the perfect balance between specialised medical description, advice for sufferers, ordinary everyday narrative, and emotional involvement.<span> </span></span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>Second, and perhaps more important, is the fact that this is a very positive, optimistic book.<span> </span>It clearly gives the message that schizophrenia <i>is treatable</i>.<span> </span>While it cannot actually be cured, substantial recovery is achievable.<span> </span>With treatment matched appropriately to the individual, a sufferer can go on to lead a very full and rewarding life, with the condition downgraded to little more than an occasional inconvenience – I certainly wasn’t previously aware that such a positive outcome was possible.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span>All these features make this book highly suitable for a variety of readers, including individuals or families affected by schizophrenia (or other mental health conditions).<span> </span>I would also suggest <i>Me, Myself, and Them</i> as a useful resource for teachers, tutors and lecturers, whose classes may include students with the kind of problems described.<span> </span>This book may also be useful for other community workers (youth leaders, clergy, etc.) who may, from time to time, encounter sufferers of this condition.<span> </span>And, of course, this book would be invaluable for <i>anyone</i> who wants to get away from popular misconceptions and gain a better-informed understanding of what schizophrenia is.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">____________ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><i>Me, Myself, and Them: A Firsthand Account of One Young Person’s Experience with Schizophrenia </i>by Kurt Snyder, with Raquel E Gur and Linda Wasmer Andrews, is published by Oxford University Press.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">ISBN 978-0-19-531122-8</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-65857223751369772772011-02-28T10:40:00.003+00:002011-02-28T10:54:17.946+00:00To Care, or Not to Care .... in the Community<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">‘Care in the Community’ is the expression used in Britain for the policy whereby residential psychiatric institutions are either reduced or eliminated, with sufferers of mental health disorders being cared for in their homes with the support of community mental health services. Similar policies known by various names – e.g. ‘Deinstitutionalization’, ‘Community Release’, etc. – have been followed in many other countries, including the United States. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">In various comments I have made, I’ve tended to speak in favour of the policy – while also acknowledging that it is not without its problems. Given my particular interest in children’s psychiatric services, I have argued that it is far better for a child suffering with depression (for example) to be cared for in as normal and homely an environment as possible, rather than being ‘locked away’ in an institution as though he or she were a young offender.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">In my blog of 21 February 2011, I reviewed Patrick and Henry’s Cockburn’s book, <i>Henry’s Demons</i> (published by Simon & Schuster). Patrick Cockburn is particularly vocal in his criticism of ‘Care in the Community’. He describes the expression as ‘one of the most deceptive and hypocritical phrases ever devised by a government’. As the old psychiatric institutions were closed down in the 1980s and ’90s, Cockburn argues that those patients who had known some level of protection in these places were suddenly flung out onto the streets to become ‘sidewalk psychotics’. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">I have some sympathy for Patrick Cockburn’s position. After all, he has faced the difficulty of trying to secure the safety and effective treatment of his son Henry, a sufferer of schizophrenia, in a world of what he calls ‘couldn’t care less in the community’. Indeed, Cockburn presents a persuasive argument, seeing the closure of many psychiatric hospitals as nothing more than a money-saving measure leading to ‘cruelty and unnecessary misery’.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">It is, of course, perfectly true that community-based psychiatric services are often poor to non-existent (depending on region), and that many troubled people are left neglected. But just take a look at <i>The Light in My Mind</i> by Joyce Passmore (published by Speak Up Somerset), or my own book, <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> (published by CheckPoint Press), to see the other side of the coin. These are reminders of the horrors of institutional ‘care’ in the recent past. Surely, whatever the failures of ‘Care in the Community’ might be, we cannot wish to return troubled <span style="line-height: 115%;">people (young or old) to these repugnant places of incarceration</span>.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">It is also the case that we have been seriously misled if we are to believe that residential psychiatric care no longer exists. It is true that the larger Victorian-style asylums have gone, as have many of their associated children’s units, but that is not to say that in-patient mental institutions have completely disappeared. I was very surprised to discover that there are roughly <a href="http://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/PDF/InpatientCAMHSDirectoryApril2005.pdf">seventy-five children’s and adolescents’ residential mental units</a> </span><span style="font-size: small;">–</span><span style="font-size: small;"> run by the NHS (National Health Service)</span><span style="font-size: small;"> –</span><span style="font-size: small;"> in the UK today (plus several more privately run units). </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">My hope is, of course, that these units of today are more caring and empathetic places than the ones that existed in the past. But given that their existence is hardly common knowledge, what happens inside them – good or bad – is hidden from our view. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">And this, I think, brings us to what might be the central issue. These places are hidden, and <i>maybe</i> this is what we as a society prefer; we <i>don’t want</i> the mentally and emotionally disturbed living among us. Perhaps this is why many of us don’t like ‘Care in the Community’. Maybe we would prefer damaged and troubled individuals </span><span style="font-size: small;">–</span><span style="font-size: small;"> adults and children – to be shut away where we can’t see them. It isn't nice to think about these things, so perhaps we prefer the easy option of not having to </span><span style="font-size: small;">–</span><span style="font-size: small;"> that is, until we or our families are affected personally.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">In this time of austerity, when already hard-pressed services are likely to face further cuts, I would dare to suggest that ‘Care in the Community’ <i>can still work</i>, and <i>work well</i>, but only if we as a community actually <i>start </i>to care. After all, even in hard times, we are perfectly prepared to do our best in supporting the people we care about. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________ </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/"><span style="color: black; text-decoration: none;">www.davidaustin.eu</span></a></span></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-86952790307219103752011-02-21T13:48:00.002+00:002011-02-21T14:00:46.113+00:00Book Review - Henry's Demons<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Henry’s Demons</i> by Patrick and Henry Cockburn (published by Simon & Schuster) tells the story of a family’s testing experience of schizophrenia. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Henry (one of the co-authors) is diagnosed with this condition in 2002 at the age of 20. While an art student in Brighton, Henry’s behaviour rapidly becomes more eccentric and hazardous, until he ventures, fully clothed, into the sea at Newhaven. This leads to his admission, as a mental patient, to the Priory Hospital in Hove. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51AXWR-9HfL._SL500_AA300_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51AXWR-9HfL._SL500_AA300_.jpg" /></a></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Parts of the story are narrated by Patrick Cockburn (Henry’s father) in a considered documentary style. He interweaves explanatory details with narrative account, but what is immediately striking is how little any of the background information on schizophrenia contributes to his (or the reader’s) understanding – the reason for Henry’s development of the condition largely remains a mystery (though cannabis use is heavily implicated as a possible cause). And so the reader is drawn into the anxiety and bewilderment associated with the situation.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Other parts are narrated by Henry himself, in an almost hurried, but extremely arresting, style. He talks of experiencing the onset of his condition as a spiritual awakening, with his perspective on the world becoming significantly altered. As some of the events described take place in Brighton – somewhere I’m reasonably familiar with – I personally find it fascinating to see particular experiences unfolding against recognisable backdrops. For instance, there’s a vision of the Buddha on Brighton beach and the planting of a banana tree outside the Concorde 2 music venue. This locatedness – whether in Brighton, Canterbury, Youghal (in Ireland), or elsewhere </span><span style="font-size: small;">–</span><span style="font-size: small;"> gives an additional tangibility to these occurrences. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">As the story unfolds, via one or other of the narrators, a growing sense of the enormity of Henry’s condition becomes apparent. There is no quick fix for what had happened; in fact, there is no fix at all. What is more, Henry himself is not always convinced that he has a problem, and so his willingness to take his medication (olanzapine, clozapine, etc.) is intermittent. When he takes it, his delusions and erratic actions are somewhat controlled (though not reliably so); when he doesn’t, he seems to positively revel in extreme and disturbing behaviour (climbing to great heights, walking close to railways lines, running naked through snow, and so on). What Henry doesn’t necessarily realise, but what becomes clear to his family (and to the reader), is that this is a life sentence.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">One particularly valuable service this book does is to underline the injustices associated with mental health problems, especially schizophrenia. Various truths are highlighted, including the fact that the media often demonise sufferers as violent (statistically, very few are), that society in general often treats them with (at best) disregard, and that sufferers are far more likely to be dismissed from their jobs than if they had a physical condition. It is also pointed out that, on occasions, sufferers placed in hospital wards can be allowed less fresh air and exercise than would a convicted offender.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span lang="EN-US">Given the downbeat quality of the story and many of the associated observations, it is tempting to wonder if there’s any chance of the book ending on a positive, uplifting note. I won’t give anything away, but it I <i>will</i> say that the reader does <i>not</i> finish the final chapter with a sense of desolation. Instead (for me, anyway) there is a sense of worthwhile insight bordering on enlightenment. </span></span></div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________ </span></div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal; line-height: 115%;">Henry’s Demons: Living with Schizophrenia, a Father and Son's Story</span></i><span style="color: black; font-weight: normal; line-height: 115%;"> by Patrick and Henry Cockburn is published by Simon & Schuster</span></span></div><div class="Textbody" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-84737-703-6</span></div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</span></div><div class="Default" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: small;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/"><span class="InternetLink">www.davidaustin.eu</span></a></span></div><div class="Default" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><br />
</div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-44460044494089270962011-02-15T11:00:00.005+00:002011-02-15T18:02:23.225+00:00What Then and Where Now?<style type="text/css">
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<div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Sometimes as I prepare to write my blog I start to wonder if there’s anything left to say. But then some little thing will happen that makes me realise that there is nearly <i>always</i> something to say.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">This week, two questions have come to mind: (1) ‘What then?’ and (2) ‘Where now?’ I’ll deal with the ‘What then?’ first.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Thanks to the wonders of social networking, I received a message this week from one of my old school classmates from the mid-1970s. This was someone I knew immediately before I experienced the events that ‘inspired’ my novel <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i>. She told me that, as far as she knew, I had just ‘disappeared’ from school with no explanation. Having become aware of my book, she now realised what had happened – that I’d been taken away from school (and home) and placed in a psychiatric unit because I was depressed.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">This made me think of three other children who went to that same school who were also (at different times) ‘spirited away’ to the very same psychiatric institution. I didn’t know any of them while I was at that school, but I got to know them at the institution. This makes me wonder whether their sudden absences went unexplained in the same way that mine did. After all, <i>I</i> certainly hadn’t been aware of anyone ‘disappearing’ like that, but at least one of those ‘disappearances’ had happened before mine.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">It is a horrible thought that, on certain (comparatively rare) occasions, children could simply be plucked out of their schools almost unnoticed. Their friends would wonder what had happened to them, of course, and no doubt some vague words of non-explanation would have been offered. But unless a child eventually returned to his or her school (some children did, some didn’t), life for everyone else would just go on, and that child would be gone and (in the end) virtually forgotten.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">And that brings me to the ‘Where now?’ </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">I have been greatly encouraged by the shift towards Care in the Community which began in the late 1980s, and which by the mid-’90s had seen many of these old children’s units closed. Care in the Community has its critics, of course – and often for good reason – but I tend to focus on the idea that a child with depression, anxiety, or some other similar condition, is far better off in as normal environment as possible, rather than being ‘incarcerated’ in a clinical and often hostile mental unit.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">The hope is that things are far better these days, and that far fewer troubled children get institutionalised. But how can we be sure of this? The fact is that, prior to the rise of Care in the Community, very few people were aware that it happened anyway. So, if it was still happening today, would we notice?</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">This may sound like I’m being a little alarmist. Perhaps I am. But what prompts this is what I've found (which isn't much) from my attempts to discover exactly what <i>does</i> happen today. Unless you are a mental health professional, your are unlikely ever to have come across the Royal College of Psychiatrists' <a href="http://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/PDF/InpatientCAMHSDirectoryApril2005.pdf">directory of children's units</a>. This, however, lists all the child and adolescent mental health in-patient units in Britain and Ireland – and there are actually quite a lot of them! </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">I'm not going to start flinging wild accusations about. My hope (and my belief) is that these present-day units are far more compassionate and empathetic places than the ones that used to exist. But they are still well-hidden. Unless you go looking for these places, you'll never know anything about them.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">My book is about exposing a hidden world from the recent past (and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merrifield_Children%27s_Unit">Wikipedia</a> helps too!). But there remains a hidden world in the present. What I would like to see is more transparency, so that society as a whole – as well as healthcare providers – can scrutinise current practice and ensure that it is just and caring.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">____________ </div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">Delivered Unto Lions by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin-bottom: 0cm;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/"><span style="color: #00000a;"><span style="text-decoration: none;">www.davidaustin.eu</span></span></a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-16781946207488973502011-02-09T15:49:00.003+00:002011-02-15T11:00:42.780+00:00Book Review - Welcome to My Country<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Lauren Slater is a psychologist who obviously enjoys a colourful turn of phrase. In <i>Welcome to My Country</i> </span>(published by Penguin), Slater recounts her experiences of working at a clinic in Boston alongside the schizophrenic, the chronically depressed, the sociopathic, and the otherwise troubled. <span style="font-size: small;">She positively revels in vivid description, describing one patient as having ‘skin the color of deep coal’, another as having a spine ‘standing out like a string of pearls’, and yet another as having a ‘voice as bleak as a British moor’ (though, given the context of this last phrase, I can’t help wondering how many British moors the author has actually seen!). This very much underlines the fact that this is not a textbook containing dispassionate case histories, but an experiential account of engaging with mentally and emotionally disturbed individuals.</span> </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51FWM5KCVDL._SS500_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51FWM5KCVDL._SS500_.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-size: small;"></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;">Slater’s academic grounding at Harvard and Boston Universities has not fully prepared her for suddenly entering a foreign land populated by people who seem to experience reality very differently. This is a world where women can also be paintbrushes, where spaceships can rest on people’s stomachs, and where intimate relationships can be maintained with albino girls in the sky. It is among disparate individuals with disparate delusions that Slater – uneasy and occasionally offended – has to conduct group and individual therapy, encouraging patients out of their bizarre individual world experiences into a more common shared world experience.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">As Slater’s story unfolds it becomes apparent that she often succeeds in entering into the worlds of her patients – even when those worlds remain stubbornly unintelligible. She comes to empathise with her patients, even when initially revolted by some of their characteristics. This is a very striking aspect of the story, especially given her admission of how little confidence she often has in formally understanding her patients’ needs. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Despite Slater’s robust theoretical knowledge, much of what she seems to do in therapy – in terms of procedure – is little more than trial and error. Slater’s strength (and her vulnerability) seems to lie in her ability to empathise. Indeed, aspects of her patients’ stories stir up personal memories and emotions for her, leaving her pondering on the content of therapy sessions long after she has finished work for the day, and forcing her to confront certain aspects of herself. Slater even expresses the general observation that the mentally disturbed sometimes ‘force you into things you’d rather not see, not say.’ And she expands on this by confessing that, in knowing certain patients, she finds herself returning to a state of shame followed by emptiness. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">What is so disarming about this book – and what only gradually becomes apparent – is that Slater is personally familiar with psychological torment. It is this which finally gives contextual meaning to the entire book in an exquisitely moving final chapter.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Welcome to My Country</i> is a beautifully written memoir, expressing well-informed insight through a fusion of imagination, poetic language and technical knowledge. An extraordinary book.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________ </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Welcome to My Country: A Therapist’s Memoir of Madness </i>by Lauren Slater is published by Penguin Books</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-0-14-025465-5</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</span></div><div class="aStandard"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-35397907255575885872011-02-07T10:35:00.001+00:002011-02-07T10:45:41.056+00:00Accepting Difference<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The speech on multiculturalism, delivered in Munich by British Prime Minister David Cameron on 5 February 2011, has been generating a good deal of discussion in the press. Comments like ‘We need a lot less of the passive tolerance of recent years’ have gathered a good deal of support from some papers (e.g. <i>The Times</i>) while being greeted with suspicion by others (e.g. <i>The Guardian</i>). Cameron was, of course, primarily criticising alleged tolerance of one very particular and small subculture, i.e. ‘extremists’ of the Islamic faith persuasion. But multiculturalism (depending on how you define it) encapsulates far more than this one single issue.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">So what does multiculturalism have to do with the usual topic for discussion on this blog, i.e. matters related to mental health? The answer to that lies in the issue of ‘difference’. Difference of the cultural variety may not seem obviously related to mental health. When presented with the word ‘culture’, I suspect many of us will think either of ‘high culture’ (e.g. opera) or something vaguely connected with ‘national culture’. But many groups have their own cultures, such as families or members of a particular profession. And other groups are often seen <i>as though</i> they were a culture, such as the so-called ‘disabled community’. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Society, very broadly speaking, can sometimes appear to regard people with mental health problems – or past sufferers of mental health problems – as if they were an identifiable cultural group. In this way, a whole swathe of people with little or no connection to one another get marked out as ‘different’. </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">David Cameron has said, '[W]e have encouraged different cultures to live separate lives, apart from each other and the mainstream.' </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Cameron was not, of course, talking about mental health. But he may as well have been. Because many people with present or past mental health difficulties are marked out as different by society (as are many people of certain national, ethnic or faith backgrounds) they are not really welcomed into the mainstream. As such it is only natural that some should choose to live separately from those around them. And by segregating themselves, they become even less welcomed by the mainstream, and so they segregate themselves further.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">What has prompted me to post these observations is hearing the story of a physically disabled woman (whom I will not identify) who is so fed up with the verbal abuse she receives when venturing out into public areas that she often avoids it, feeling very uninclined to ‘integrate’ with the mainstream. This is, no doubt, an experience she has in common with people with many conditions – mental and neurological, as well as physical.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Cameron says, ‘We need a lot less of the passive tolerance of recent years.’ Given that so many people, through no fault of their own, are <i>not</i> tolerated by much of society – passively or otherwise – leads me to conclude that this was a very unfortunate statement. Clearly I am interpreting it in a way that was not intended, but surely politicians should be aware that the ‘enemies’ they target are not always the ones who take the hit. I am sure this is not what Cameron wants, but many people will get (and, apparently, <i>have</i> got) the message that it’s good and proper to be intolerant of difference.</span></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">So when it comes to people with mental, neurological or physical difficulties (along with many other people), I say that what we need <i>instead </i>of ‘passive tolerance’ is ‘active acceptance’.</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">____________ </span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</span></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</span></div><div class="aStandard"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small;">For more information visit <a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/">www.davidaustin.eu</a></span></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-4315098020720433132011-01-31T12:56:00.002+00:002011-01-31T14:59:29.128+00:00Where is the Case for the Defence?<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In some recent radio interviews (and a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOAEnCTezWo">YouTube video</a>) in which I have discussed my book, <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i>, I have made a number of general allegations in connection with the experiences and issues that ‘inspired’ it. I have talked about the former Merrifield Children’s Unit at Tone Vale Psychiatric Hospital in Somerset (the basis for the fictional Oakdale Unit of my book), and I have suggested that some of what I experienced and witnessed there in the 1970s was abusive.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My allegations have, admittedly, been non-specific. I haven’t named names, but focussed instead on the system that allowed certain things to happen. I have criticised the institution’s reliance on drugs to treat and control its patients, along with my opinion that it was inappropriate to subject developing brains to these potent substances, and in such doses. I have also referred to excessively aggressive forms of restraint, and the isolation of children in a small room with their clothes taken away from them (and I haven’t always remembered to point out that these things were occasional rather than regular events). </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I could have said more, of course, but daytime radio may not be the best forum for a discussion on the horrendous response to incidents of sexual abuse (but such things are covered in my book).</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What amazes me is that no one (as far as I am aware) has yet come forward to defend Merrifield Unit, or children’s psychiatric units more generally. And no one (again, as far as I am aware) has yet emerged to condemn my book as sensationalist fabrication (though, if anything, I consider it understated in places). </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It is true, of course, that my book is only a modest seller and that my radio interviews have only been broadcast on local stations, and have not therefore enjoyed an especially high profile. But I have certainly heard from people who <i>confirm</i> the picture I have painted, so there is clear evidence that what I have said has reached at least <i>some</i> of those interested in the topic. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What I have said in my interviews is, of course, <i>the truth</i>. And the content of <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> is a representation of that same truth. But I recognise that there are <i>at least</i> two sides to every story. So, where is the case for the defence? Why hasn’t anyone challenged me? </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It would be nice to think that those concerned (where they are aware of what I have said) have recognised the validity of my arguments and accepted that I am in the right (in which case an apology directed at former child patients would be an appropriate response). But it would be both naive and conceited to believe that that is the case. So, what is the reason for the silence? Maybe those who disagree with me simply think the issue isn’t important.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In some ways it is rather foolish of me to <i>invite</i> a challenge – I don’t actually <i>want</i> to be challenged. But the issues that lie behind my book are important ones, and that makes the silence from certain quarters ‘deafening’. Everything I have written and said on the subject is concerned with exposing the ‘hidden world’ of children’s mental health care in the recent past, but it seems that the former ‘rulers’ of this ‘hidden world’ are doing all they can to <i>stay</i> hidden – which is hardly encouraging if the same diffidence applies with regard to the <i>current</i> state of child psychiatric care.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I am aware that I am being unusually provocative here, and I continue in that vein by ending on a similarly provocative note. I have asked, ‘Where is the case for the defence?’ Could it be that there is <i>no possible </i>defence?</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">____________ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="aStandard"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For more information visit </span><a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-21128242327529596972011-01-24T10:42:00.004+00:002011-01-25T10:16:18.136+00:00Book Review - The Lives They Left Behind<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I wasn’t quite sure what to expect of <i>The Lives They Left Behind</i> by Darby Penny and Peter Stastny (published by Bellevue Literary Press). In a way, the subheading gave it away: <i>Suitcases From a State Hospital Attic</i>. But what could possibly be so interesting about suitcases? Could anything of any significance really have been left inside them? Well, the answer is a very definite yes.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The hospital in question is the Willard State Hospital in New York – originally called the Willard Asylum for the Insane – which opened in 1869 and finally closed in 1995. Soon after its closure, a very large number of patients’ suitcases were discovered in the attic of the Sheltered Workshop Building by the curator of the New York State Museum. He had been exploring the site in search of artefacts worthy of preservation.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://images.bookdepository.co.uk/assets/images/book/large/9781/9341/9781934137147.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://images.bookdepository.co.uk/assets/images/book/large/9781/9341/9781934137147.jpg" width="297" /></a></div><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The various crates, trunks, and suitcases that were found there were not empty. They contained all the remaining possessions of the patients they had belonged to: clothing, photographs, books, papers, mementos, and much more besides. The luggage was saved, and a group of archivists and curators began a ten-year plan to sift through the materials.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What <i>The Lives They Left Behind</i> does is reconstruct – as far as is possible – the biographies of a few selected patients (mainly from the earlier part of the twentieth century), drawing on the content of their suitcases supplemented by any medical records or other documents that may have survived. What emerges makes grim reading, as these few unfortunate incarcerated patients of Willard are (at last) acknowledged as real people with real histories.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It is notable that almost all of the patients portrayed in this book are immigrants to the United States. Whether these few patients are truly representative of Willard patients in general is unclear, but if they are, there is a definite suggestion that factors such as nationality, social class and ethnicity played a role in deciding who was to be admitted to the institution. A little more clarity about this would have been helpful.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It is certainly apparent that the psychiatrists who diagnosed these patients did so according to their own social and cultural assumptions. Where there was evidence of psychotic delusion, the doctors made no effort to appreciate elements in the patient’s background – such as unfamiliar religious practices – that may have given rise to the delusions. Symptoms were observed and described, but no effort was made to understand them.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">But, as the book makes clear, until the 1960s, there was never any real thought given to ‘curing’ or rehabilitating patients; they were simply kept out of the way at Willard – often for many decades – and frequently put to work to maintain the hospital’s partially self-sustaining economy. It is especially telling that following the death of a patient whose job was to tend the hospital’s cemetery, that that particular patient was given an anonymous grave and the cemetery he had cared for so meticulously was left to become overgrown.<br />
<br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Although the lives represented in this book are well reconstructed, I get the impression that the priority given to documentary facts and their interpretation sometimes gets in the way of letting these lost voices really speak. But, on the whole, the authors achieve a good deal in bringing these hidden lives to public attention, and also drawing lessons from past psychiatric practices in a critique of the present state of mental health services.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>The Lives They Left Behind</i> has a lot to recommend it, though it may be a little ‘dry’ for some readers. However, it resists the temptation to be overly academic, and therefore paints a picture of Willard State Hospital that will be readily accessible to most people.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">____________ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>The Lives They Left Behind: Suitcases From a State Hospital Attic </i>(2009) by Darby Penney and Peter Stastny, with Photographs by Lisa Rinzler, is published by Bellevue Literary Press </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ISBN 978-1-934137-14-7</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="aStandard"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For more information visit </span><a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-78890695280827291072011-01-17T11:27:00.002+00:002011-01-23T17:28:02.625+00:00Interview for BBC Somerset, 13 January 2011<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">On Thursday, 13 January 2011, I was interviewed live (over the ’phone) by Emma Britton of BBC Somerset. The interview went out shortly after 11 am, and it concerned my book, <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i>, and the experiences that inspired it: those of having been a child psychiatric patient in the former Merrifield Children’s Unit at Tone Vale Hospital, near Taunton, in the 1970s. For copyright reasons, I cannot offer a full transcript of the interview, but I reproduce here a transcript of my own words as broadcast.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Emma Britton began by asking me how I became a patient at Merrifield.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘I was 12 years old and I was suffering with depression. It was causing problems at school, and things like that. I went through the old Child Guidance system, as it was in those days, and it was suggested that I be admitted for a short time to Merrifield. But a ‘short time’ stretched out into a much longer time, and I was there, on and off, for just over four years.’</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Emma then asked what I had thought at the time about being admitted to the unit.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘I think, prior to it actually happening, I felt quite positive about it. I thought that it would be a good thing, that it would sort out the problems I had. And a rather rosy picture of the unit had been painted for me by the psychiatrist. So I was actually quite positive – until I actually arrived there.’</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I was then asked to describe what it was like.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘It was all very traumatic. I suddenly found myself in this place surrounded by other kids with all sorts of other problems. There were kids, similar to myself, with depression, but there were also kids with anorexia. I’d never come across anything like that before, so that was quite a shock. And there were also kids who had been in trouble with the police, and perhaps had some violent tendencies. I was quite frightened of those, er, <i>older</i> kids, particularly. We were really such a mixed bunch of people. And although a lot of the staff were very good, very caring, a few of them weren’t really very sympathetic at all. It very much felt like a punitive environment, as though I was being punished for being unwell.’ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Then Emma asked why a child of 12 would have been suffering with depression in the first place.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘Well, I guess we’d had a few problems in the family. My father had been quite unwell, we’d also moved house quite recently, and I had a new baby sister. Things were very much changing at home, and I’d only been in my new school for about a year or so, and I hadn’t really adjusted too well to our new circumstances – and I think that’s what really led to my depression.’</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Emma enquired about my medical treatment.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘It was mostly drugs – antidepressants, initially. But then there were drugs like benzodiazepines, and even antipsychotics at one point. Quite a lot of drugs. And the prescription would be changed without any prior warning, so I never knew what was happening. Although my memory of the whole period is pretty good, there’s a whole section in the middle that I really don’t remember at all, and I put that down to the effect of drugs.’</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The depiction of mental hospitals in films like <i>One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest </i>was raised, and I was asked if Merrifield was anything like that.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘Cosmetically, it was different. The actual building itself and the furnishings were a lot more pleasant than what you see portrayed in films like that, and, indeed, what you see in documentaries on the old asylums. So, as I say, cosmetically it was rather better. But I think in practice there was still a lot of the same sort of attitudes: the same sort of institutional culture prevailed.’ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Emma then asked why I wanted to revisit my experiences in writing <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i>. Was it difficult? she asked.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘Yes, it was. It was extremely difficult, actually. I’d had it vaguely in mind for a number of years that I might try and do something positive with my experience. But then, a few years ago, I came across this ‘urban exploration’ <a href="http://www.derelicte.co.uk/tone-vale-hospital/comment-page-1#comments">website</a>. Now, I don’t really know too much about ‘urban exploration’ myself, but they had a feature on the old Tone Vale Hospital, and there was a sort of forum there, and a number of former Merrifield patients had posted things on there. I suddenly realised this was a very important cause, it wasn’t just about me, it was about my generation, and also about people who preceded me and followed me at Merrifield. I very much felt we <i>all</i> had a story to get out, that this was very much a hidden world. People in the Taunton area and West Somerset will have all heard of Tone Vale, but very few people will have heard of Merrifield – they won’t have known that children were treated in this sort of way. So I wanted to get the story out.’</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The question then came up of my book being described as a novel.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘It falls between two stalls really, because it’s not, strictly speaking, biography – although there’s a lot of biography in it – and it’s not, strictly speaking, fiction. What I’ve done, to protect the identities of other people, is to change names and alter some of the situations a bit, and relocate the whole thing to another location, in Sussex. So, I’ve done that, so in that sense it’s <i>like</i> a work of fiction, but it very closely follows my own experiences and also the things I witnessed. So a lot of it can be taken quite literally, but there is some sort of artistic invention in there as well, particularly to cover gaps in my memory.’</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Emma then asked if I was pleased to hear that Merrifield and Tone Vale had been closed and a new village built in their place. She also asked how I felt about the shift in the approach towards people with mental health problems.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘On the whole, I’m quite pleased about that. I know there’s been a lot of criticism of Care in the Community, and there’s been a number of high-profile cases where it hasn’t worked, with tragic results. But on the whole, I think it’s been a very positive move, especially for children. And, of course, I was very pleased to hear that the hospital and the children’s unit had been closed down. But I do have some reservations as well, because now, at Cotford St Luke [the new village built on the site], there’s no real sign that Merrifield Unit existed at all – you wouldn’t know it had ever been there. Although that’s good in one sense – that something new and positive has been built on the site – on the other hand, it’s a bit like having your memories buried. I very much think we should <i>learn</i> from history to make sure these things don’t happen again, so it’s almost as if the evidence has been removed. But, generally, I think it’s a very positive thing. In a way, that piece of land, as it were, has been kind of 'redeemed' or 'saved' by having housing built on it. That’s great, really.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The issue of catharsis was then broached: had writing the book laid any demons to rest?</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘To a certain extent, but rather than the actual act of writing the book – which, as I said, was extremely difficult – what I have found very helpful for me is some of the reaction I’ve had to it. I’ve heard from some other former patients of Merrifield, and other people who are interested, and just hearing that reaction, hearing that perhaps in a small way I may have helped one or two people, that has really helped <i>me</i>. That’s made quite a big difference to me, and it’s put the whole experience into a new perspective.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Finally, Emma asked about my current state of health.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">‘Well, I have my ups and downs. I’m pretty good, on the whole. Not perfect, but not bad.’ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">____________ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="aStandard"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For more information visit </span><a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-12862133577534579892011-01-13T10:40:00.001+00:002011-01-13T10:57:46.915+00:00Demolishing the Asylum<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">With the rise of Care in the Community in the 1980s and ’90s, the old Victorian asylums were finally closed. What is less well known is that this period also saw the closure of children’s psychiatric units – places like Merrifield in Somerset and Gwynfa in North Wales (both were closed in the mid-’90s). </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The reason why the closure of these units is less well known than that of the adult mental hospitals is that very few people were aware these places existed in the first place. Before Care in the Community reached its height, most people in any given area would know the name of their region’s ‘madhouse’, but hardly anyone would be aware of the equivalent provision for children.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Although my book, <i>Delivered Unto Lions</i>, is set in a fictional children’s unit in Mid Sussex, I make no secret of the fact that it is inspired by the Merrifield Children’s Unit which used to stand in the grounds of the former Tone Vale Hospital in Somerset. Merrifield is gone now, completely demolished, as is most of the Tone Vale complex – only a few (Grade II Listed) buildings remain. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Tone Vale is not unique in this respect. This is what has happened to many of the old asylums in Britain – parts have been demolished (or allowed to fall down) while features considered to be of architectural merit have been preserved.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In some cases, new housing has been built on the sites of old mental hospitals, and some former hospital buildings have been converted into flats. This is what has been happening with High Royds Asylum in West Yorkshire and the Cumberland and Westmorland Counties Asylum near Carlisle, to name just two.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This is also what has happened with Tone Vale. A whole new village – called Cotford St Luke – has been built on the site. But while the few remaining parts of the old hospital have been incorporated into the village, there is nothing left of the children’s unit whatsoever – you would never know it had been there.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">On the whole, I think this is very positive. To my mind it is quite right that a place where children were subjected to unpleasant institutional ‘care’ should have been ‘rescued’ from its dark history and put to new and better use. There is a sense in which Merrifield has been ‘redeemed’. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Merrifield was an institution where children with a wide variety of mental health disorders (and sometimes with no real disorders at all!), were placed in isolation from normal society. It was common practice to drug these children excessively, and often inappropriately, with no thought to what these substances might do to the developing brain. Some children were also occasionally subjected to abuse, and many were treated in a generally punitive way, as though being depressed or anorexic, for instance, was some sort of moral offence. But the site where these things happened is now a housing estate, providing homes for individuals and families. It has been saved from its past.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Of course, not all of Merrifield’s former patients can say that they too have been saved from their past. While some have made substantial recoveries from their original conditions and also overcome the trauma of their time in residential psychiatric care, others have had their lives permanently blighted by the way they were once treated – even if that treatment was well-intentioned. As a former Merrifield patient myself, I can say that I am very lucky, having been able to live a relatively full and satisfying life since leaving that place – though I am still very much haunted by my memories.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This introduces another aspect to the demolition of Merrifield – and places like Merrifield. While it is good that the unit is gone, having been replaced by something of greater community benefit, I have one particular concern connected with its destruction. There is now no concrete reminder at that place of what once happened there. While there are many adults still troubled by their experiences at Merrifield, there is a sense in which the evidence for these past traumas has been swept under the carpet. While few people would have known of Merrifield’s existence when it was open, now there is no sign that the place ever existed <i>at all</i>. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">And so I conclude with a challenging paradox. It is good to build over a place of past distress with something new and positive. But it is also bad to bury the past as though it never happened. In rescuing places and people from troubled histories, we should still remember those histories and learn from them. How else can we make sure that history is not repeated?</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">____________ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="aStandard"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For more information visit </span><a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1439535880046940446.post-71944129873796162732011-01-10T12:28:00.004+00:002011-01-10T18:13:07.055+00:00Book Review - The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time<div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For my second attempt at a book review I have decided to take a look at <i>The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time</i> by Mark Haddon (published by Vintage). <i>Curious Incident</i> is a work of fiction written in the first-person from the perspective of a 15-year old boy with Asperger’s Syndrome (an Autism Spectrum Disorder).</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The book is, supposedly, a murder mystery in which teenager Christopher Boone sets about investigating the death of a neighbour’s dog. But the ‘murder mystery’ isn’t really the subject of the book, but rather a means for getting into the <i>real</i> story. This is the story of a boy who, due to his condition, has difficulty relating to the ‘normal’ social world. Much of the plot centres on the way he naively attempts to satisfy his enquiring mind while steering his way through family tensions and the well-meant advice of staff at his special school. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51qEtZObcgL._SS500_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51qEtZObcgL._SS500_.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The novel has been generally well-received – indeed, it is an international bestseller – but some commentators with first-hand experience of Asperger’s Syndrome have questioned its accuracy in portraying the condition. For readers who would prefer a more authentic account of AS, I would suggest they read <i>Freaks, Geeks and Asperger Syndrome</i> by Luke Jackson.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Nonetheless, the confidence of Mark Haddon’s writing means that the central character of Christopher comes over as convincing (allowing for the absence of a more nuanced view of AS) and the story is plotted in a very engaging way. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The major strength of <i>Curious Incident</i>, in my view, lies not in the accuracy (or inaccuracy) of its portrayal of Asperger’s, but in its observation of the ‘normal’ social world of human relationships and interactions. In this sense it stands alongside modern fable, such as Richard Adams’ <i>Watership Down, </i>and some of the more literary examples of science fiction, in placing the reader at a distance from the ‘real’ subject matter. From this distance, the reader is able to see essential themes from a new angle while also being entertained.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Another strength rests in what the book says about the responses of ‘normal’ people to someone with a mental health or neurological condition. These responses range from the impatient refusal to answer questions and well-intentioned deception, all the way through to blatant mockery and hostility.</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I must, however, raise another word of caution. <i>Curious Incident</i> is written in a style somewhat reminiscent of Jacqueline Wilson’s <i>Tracy Beaker</i> books. Wilson’s books are, of course, aimed at children, but while <i>Curious Incident</i> is indeed available in a children’s edition (with a different cover design; the text remains unchanged), it is not suitable for pre-teens due to some of its content (including a very high number of expletives).</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Allowing for the two qualifications I have mentioned (its inexact portrayal of Asperger’s and its unsuitability for children), I have no hesitation in recommending this book. </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">____________ </div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time </i>by Mark Haddon is published by Vintage</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ISBN 0-099-45025-9</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Delivered Unto Lions</i> by David Austin is published by CheckPoint Press</div><div class="aStandard" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ISBN 978-1-906628-21-5</div><div class="aStandard"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For more information visit </span><a href="http://www.davidaustin.eu/" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.davidaustin.eu</a></div>David Austinhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15578474886944913136noreply@blogger.com0