The Wisdom of the Ego by George E Vaillant
Something horrible happens, and our minds play tricks on us, tell us that it never happened, that it occurred differently, or isn't quite what it seems. Such trickery, the psychiatrist George Vaillant tells us, is actually healthy. What's more, it can reveal the mind at its most creative and mature, soothing and protecting us in the face of unbearable reality, managing the unmanageable, ordering disorder. In "The Wisdom of the Ego", Vaillant gives us a look at how the mind's defences work, how they evolve and change, and so, change us. Freud tells us that the first five years of life constitute destiny. If this were so, Vaillant asks, then how is it that many deeply troubled youths become well-adjusted, productive adults? Drawing on the Study of Adult Development, this book takes us into the lives of such individuals - thriving men and women who suffered grievous disadvantages and abuses during childhood - to show us that the mind's remarkable defences develop well into adulthood, that the maladjustments of adolescence can evolve into the virtues of maturity. He introduces us to middle-aged men and women learning how to make love, to make meaning, to reorder chaos. Because he considers that creativity is so intrinsic to this alchemy of the ego, Vaillant mingles these life studies with psycho-biographies of famous artists. We meet Florence Nightingale, the intractable hypochondriac and hopeless dreamer who, at the age of 31 wrote in her diary, "I see nothing desirable but death", and watch as she transformd her anguish into altruism, her fantasies into success. In the tormented life of Sylvia Plath, we see psychosis as not only a defect but also an effort at repair, her poetry as an illustration of the adaptive process. We witness the working of the mind's defences in the career of Anna Freud, their greatest elucidator. And in the case of Eugene O'Neill, we enter the irony-filled borderland between madness and great art. In these portraits, Vaillant aims to chart the evolution of the ego's defences, from the psychopathic to the sublime, and from the mundane to the most ingenious.George E. Vaillant, MD, is a psychoanalyst and a research psychiatrist who is credited with being one of the first to investigate adult development. He is a Harvard University professor who supervised Harvard's Study of Adult Development for 35 years. He is the author of several books, including Aging Well, Triumphs of Experience, and The Natural History of Alcoholism, and his 1977 book, Adaptation to Life, is considered a classic in the field of adult development. He is a part-time employee at Massachusetts General Hospital and lives in Orange, California.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780674953727 |
| ISBN 10 | 067495372X |
| Title | The Wisdom of the Ego |
| Author | George E Vaillant |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Hardback |
| Publisher | Harvard University Press |
| Year published | 1993-01-01 |
| Number of pages | 406 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |