Review of Speech Matters by Katharine Gelber

This is an exceptionally clear and well organised text, making it easy to read for just about anyone interested in matters of free speech, particularly with regard to political speech, which is her interest of concern. Katharine Gelber researches, writes, and teaches in the field of politics and human rights, being an Associate Professor of Politics and Public Policy at the University of Queensland. Speech Matters: Getting Free Speech Right is her fourth book.

Continued at M/C Reviews: Culture and the Media.

Review of Irrepressible: The Life and Times of Jessica Mitford by Leslie Brody

On first glance, I was unsure about the author’s attitude to her subject: the cover of the book shows a rather evil-looking Jessica Mitford stubbing out a cigarette in an ashtray. Is Leslie Brody critical of Mitford’s life as a muckraker, Communist, civil rights activist, aristocrat, sister to the fascist Diana and Unity, and writer? It turns out that she is definitely not; in fact, quite the opposite. Her strong principles and fun-loving attitude to life are celebrated here.

For those unfamiliar with the Mitford family, they were a large and unusual clan who lived in Swinbrook House in Oxfordshire, England from 1926. Lord and Lady Redesdale (‘Farve’ and ‘Muv’ to their children) had six daughters and one son: Nancy (writer of Love in A Cold Climate, amongst many others); Pamela (nicknamed ‘Woman’ because of her domesticity); Tom (killed in WWII); Diana (married British fascist leader Oswald Mosley); Unity (worshipped Hitler); Jessica; and Deborah (or ‘Debo’, who became the Duchess of Devonshire). Jessica’s nicknames included ‘Brave Little D’, which her mother called her, ‘Boud’, ‘Hen’ and ‘Susan’, which was used by Nancy, who was also called Susan by Jessica, just to make things confusing. The name that really stuck, though, was Decca.


Continued at The Compulsive Reader.

Review of Your Voice in My Head: A Memoir by Emma Forrest

Emma Forrest's memoir about having a mental illness—in her case, a type of bipolar disorder with rapid cycling between depression and mania—is engrossing and involving. She knows how to write poetically and viscerally, conveying the pain and despair of her illness in vivid terms. At times she comes across as self-absorbed and irritating in her self-abuse, but that is the often the nature of mental illness. When something goes wrong with your mind, it is difficult to control your thoughts and behavior; Forrest shows this well.


Continue reading at Metapsychology Online Reviews.

Review of The Memory Palace: A Memoir by Mira Bartók

The Memory Palace is one of the most beautiful, tragic and hopeful memoirs that you will ever read. Mira Bartók's artistry, imagination, compassion, and skill with words have created a book about family and mental illness that will be read for many years to come by a wide range of people: the mentally ill, their families and friends, mental health professionals, social service workers, and—I would hope—politicians and the wider community.


Continue reading at Metapsychology Online Reviews.

Review of Evergreen Review Winter 2011

The history of Evergreen Review is an important part of the experience of reading the journal, but could be easily missed if you happened upon the website without knowing anything about it. Click on the ‘History’ link at the top of any page, and what is revealed is impressive and significant, to say the least. It was founded by the legendary Barney Rosset in 1957, and the first issue contained work by Jean-Paul Sartre and Samuel Beckett. The second issue was the first collection of work by the Beat writers, such as Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and Gary Snyder. Rosset had also bought Grove Press in 1951 when he was twenty-eight, and went on to publish the work of numerous writers such as Beckett, Ionesco, Pinter, Duras and Borges, as well as William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch, D H Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover, and Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer, for which he fought, and won, legal challenges against obscenity.

Continued at The Review Review.

Review of All About Love by Lisa Appignanesi

Lisa Appignanesi has written ten novels, several books of non-fiction (including Freud’s Women and Mad, Bad and Sad: A History of Women and the Mind Doctors from 1800 to the Present), and is general editor of the Small Books on Big Ideas series of Profile Books. She was one of the founding members of the Writers and Readers publishing cooperative, and is currently Chair of the Board of the Freud Museum. One of her many interests is memory, and she has written a novel and a memoir based on her research and involvement with the Brain and Behaviour Laboratory at the Open University. She is also the president of English PEN.


This distillation of her biography (see her official website) shows a woman interested in the human mind, behaviour, and expression. Her latest book, All About Love: Anatomy of an unruly emotion, allows her to expand on all of these subjects. She really engages in a conversation with her readers, discussing Freud’s ideas and referring to philosophers and writers through the centuries. Numerous works of literature are analysed, from Ian McEwan to Proust to Tolstoy. It is an entertaining as well as an informative book.


Continue reading at M/C Reviews 'words'.

Review of Understanding Troubled Minds by Sidney Bloch

The first edition of Understanding Troubled Minds: A guide to mental illness and its treatments came out in 1997, and was written by psychiatrists Sidney Bloch and Bruce Singh. They had just finished a textbook of psychiatry for medical students and realised that a version for the general public was needed. They wanted to provide a ‘clear, well-informed , objective assessment of the nature of mental illness and its treatment’ (viii) and Bloch, in this thoroughly updated second edition, has maintained and continued that goal.


Perhaps every household should have a copy of this book. The stigma of ‘madness’ is persistent, with news reports of disturbed people attacking members of the public doing little to alter fearful attitudes. The book methodically and clearly describes the variety of mental illness experience, how conditions are diagnosed and treated, and what drugs and psychotherapies are generally used. Bloch writes well, and includes many examples of literary references to mental illness, as well as case studies and personal experiences by public figures. This makes it an approachable reference book without jargon.


Continue reading at M/C Reviews 'words'.