Two ways of confronting the problems of relationships, 31 Oct 2008
Yalom is a psychotherapist who practises not only individual but also group therapy, and this novel is about the situation in a group therapy setting. After Julius Hertzfeld, the therapist, has been diagnosed with a fatal disease, he asks himself what in life he has achieved and where he has failed. He seeks out Philip Slate, a former patient of his of many years ago with whom he had failed, in order to find out whether after all some part of the therapy had been useful to Philip. It turns out that Philip, a cold fish if ever there was one, is training to be a therapist himself, though what he plans to offer is philosophical therapy, based on the teachings of Schopenhauer. But to qualify he needs a professional supervisor. Julius thinks Philip is totally unqualified to help others, but he agrees to act as his supervisor provided Philip first attends his group therapy sessions - partly because he hopes that he might succeed in helping Philip this time where he had failed previously. Philip offers to tutor him in Schopenhauer's philosophy in exchange, which Julius is not particularly interested to learn about: Julius believes that a rounded life requires warm human relationships and an affirmation of life, whereas Schopenhauer and his disciple Philip believe that wisdom requires you to detach yourself from human relationships and to come to terms with the ephemerality of life and to see that, sub specie aeternitatis, almost everything which seems important to us and about which we worry - attachments to things and to people, to love and to hate, and above all any concern about what other people think of us - is in fact quite insignificant. Philip at times seems to be taking over the group, dishing up Schopenhauerian advice which most members lap up.

Julius, like the therapist in Yalom's brilliant earlier book, Lying on the Couch [see my review], has problems of his own, which also become a subject for the group's discussions. He has told the group about his fatal melanoma, and so his impending death - and of attitudes to death in general - are frequently touched upon.

Once you accept the somewhat unlikely premise of the bargain between Julius and Philip, the book works very well. The characterizations are excellent. I don't myself have experience of group therapy, but I thought the dialogue during the sessions was very convincing, and towards the end is very cathartic. What I found particularly interesting is that, though Julius often asked the crucial questions, the other members of the group learnt to do this as well. For this, what is needed is not only a developing emotional intelligence, but an intellectual intelligence also, and it is clear that all the members of that group - even the one who was `uneducated', possessed it. Julius himself calls it `high-powered'.

The narrative is interspersed with chapters about Schopenhauer's life and aspects of his work, presented not by Julius or Philip, but by Yalom, with the occasional psychological interpretation and the firm conclusion that this brilliant but aggressive and solitary man, with whom Philip so closely identified himself, would certainly be a candidate for psychotherapy were he alive today. On the other hand Schopenhauer's insights anticipate so much of later Freudian theory that - even if, in Yalom's view, there can really be no `Schopenhauer Cure' - the author obviously has considerable respect for him. Schopenhauer's view of life is a defence, a wall behind which unhappy men and women may shelter for a while; but walls cut you off from real life. And in his last writings even Schopenhauer softened his bleak view and his insistence on isolation.

Look what they've done to my brains, ma... , 10 Sep 2007
If you happen to be of the opinion that:
a) Life is a pretty unpleasant experience, full of silly cravings, boredom and suffering;
b) This world really does not offer much comfort, rather resembling, as Hamlet would say, "a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours" (and this was before humans were surrounded by factories and roads!);
c) Most (if not all) human beings you meet are not only incredibly dull but full of unrealistic opinions and expectations...

Well then, look no further, Yalom has got just the cure for you! (Not that you had thought you were ill, of course, but believe us, you are!) In his wonderfully enlightening novel you can learn all about your true ailment. However sane (and soothing) your ideas may appear to yourself, if they aren't upbeat and optimistic and full of hope, then oh dear, you are an antisocial character in urgent need of help!
Yalom offers a very easy solution for your anomaly: group therapy. All you have to do is expose yourself to hour-long superficial chattering sessions with a bunch of strangers about their private little expectations and frustrations (as if one didn't get enough of that day in and day out). This, the experienced psychiatrist turned novelist explains, will help you understand just how WRONG you are. Forget about centuries of wisdom - from Buddha through Aristotle to the infamous Schopenhauer - that might in any way support your endeavour to distance yourself from the banalities and pains of everyday life. After all, as Yalom will gladly prove to you, those great sages lived in the awful past, when there was poverty and hunger and toil and wars and violence and hatred and ignorance - things we have long overcome, as you have surely noticed (if not, you're obviously reading/watching questionable things). What you need is to appreciate the elevating powers of human contact: such as evenings spent with your pals in a crowded bar, drinking beers and discussing the Giants (metaphysical issues are so passé!); or ever exciting emotional involvements with people who just crave to give you some love (never mind what that's supposed to be).

The highly therapeutic way in which Yalom chooses to prove just how lonely one may end up being if one indulges in the slightest negative thoughts regarding the company of other bipeds is quite astonishing and does deserve some careful reading: by creating a highly antisocial, arrogant and detached character supposedly resembling a modern-day Schopenhauer, the author shows us step by step the uselessness of following that great philosopher's wise advice in order to make life (slightly) more bearable. Confronting this (quite superficial) Schopenhauer-like character with a wonderfully caring psychotherapist plus his entourage of regularly confused but life-loving patients, Yalom's novel actually provides a very good example of the power of group-enforced conformity. Indeed, in the hands of this helpful bunch of astonishingly appealing one-dimensional characters, our protagonist undergoes a great transformation, gradually distancing himself from the most down-to-earth, but alas unappetizing, teachings of his supposed master, Schopenhauer.
You see, that German philosopher really was a cranky chap. Reading Yalom's novel will in fact provide you with countless quotations from his works, as well as a pretty good overview of his life. Sure, he was a genius and influenced many other brains (such as Nietzsche, Cekhov, Freud, Thomas Mann). But Yalom concludes also that Schopenhauer was an unhappy human (as compared to the rest of us, apparently) who could have well used a heavy dose of therapy to cure him from his dreadful pessimism and socio-phobia! Unfortunately for him (but very fortunately for his readers/followers), the wonderful business of psychotherapy had still not been invented back then. So our friend the philosopher was doomed to content himself with thinking and writing.
We are only so lucky nowadays that we can resort to doctors as soon as the slightest feeling of spiritual discomfort sets in. And there's even rumour of an anti-pessimism pill being manufactured as we speak... Schopenhauer no more!

But just in case you are mad enough to actually want to hold on to your negative views (at your own risk!), I would strongly advise you to skip this book and go to the sources instead: Schopenhauer's "Counsels and Maxims" is not only a great introduction to his wise words, but just about indispensable for anyone interested in understanding the roots of our sufferings (and how to deal with them). And Rudiger Safranski's "Schopenhauer and the Wild Years of Philosophy" will provide you with a much more accurate (and less judgemental) portrait of this amazingly realistic philosopher's life and influences.


A must for anyone interested in group psychotherapy, and a good read too, 22 Dec 2006
The Schopenhauer Cure may not be the great novel that When Nietsche Wept is but it is a brilliant text. As a fictional account of group therapy at its best, it offers excellent insights into group dynamics and the way that a skillful group analyst can guide and encourage them to unfold. There are sections of the book that read like therapeutic versions of Plato's Symposium, where the dynamics of the characters, enable them to discover voices within themselves that they would not have known otherwise.

The book's central character, Dr Julius Hertzfeld, a group analyst with a year to live makes his final year of weekly meetings with a group of patients his last will and testament. The accounts of what goes on during these sessions are utterly compelling, the best feature of the book. The presence in these group sessions of a patient from Hertzfeld's past, Philip Slate (a meaningful name for those familiar with 'microcosms'), a self-confessed sex addict who found solace and a cure for his addiction in the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer, is what gives them their unforgettable quality. Slate does not preach Schopenhauer, he lives him or at least tries to do so. The presence in the group of a victim of Slate's earlier addiction makes forces Slate to put his philosophy of life to the test. In the course of the therapy sessions, we rediscover the central characters afresh, share some of their preoccupations and struggles.

Two features of the book left me with more mixed feelings. The account of Julius, a man who has a year of life, is not as rich as that of the other characters. He comes across through the idealizing lenses through which his patients see him, or maybe Irvin Yalom, a fellow-psychotherapist, choses to portray him. When all patients confess a hidden part from their past, Julius, prompted by Philip, also makes a confession but it seems anodyne and defensive to the point where even cursory self-analysis would suggest that much more is hiding there. Julius's idealization of his dead wife also seems to conceal more than we are let in on. His attempt to live with the knowledge of imminent dying is only half-developed in the novel. What, however, is excellently portrayed is how his patients learn to live with their therapist's death, without experiencing him as a 'corpse', someone contact with whom is painful or embarrassing.

The other thing I found somewhat less compelling are the chapters that take us back to the life, thought and work of Schopenhauer. As a genre, it reminded me of Kundera's, episodic return to the world of Goethe in Immortality, but it does not work so well. Schopenhauer is a curious philosopher - I am not sure that anyone can get to know him through these brief excursions into his life. A misanthrope who came to advocate compassion, a fame-hunter who excoriated fame, a truly great thinker who disclocated Western philosophy from its firm pedestal of LOGOS and sought to relocate it on the WILL, he needs far more time and patience to understand than is available to Yalom. All the same, this is a formidable achievement and a must for anyone interested in group psychotherapy.

Yalom reached a target, I couldn't see, 18 Apr 2006
I found it hard to put this book down. I read it in evey spare moment, until it was finished. Philosophy often poses the queston, 'how should we live'. The beauty of this novel, is it weaves many different perspectives on this question. Firstly it has the lives of the characters in the theapy group. How they are attempting to change themselves based on the fact that, how they act in a therapy group situation, is how they will act in the real world. If they can analyse and change, how they act in the group they can identify their problems and combat them. Secondly Yalom uses a character Philip Slate as modern day version of Arthur Schopenhauer. He becomes a mouthpiece for the philosophy of Schopenhauer, focusing on how Schopenhauer thought we should live and his pessimistic account of human existence. To add a futher dimension, biographical accounts of Schopenhauer's life are added and selected quotes begin each chapter. Although certain view-points are seen more sympathetically than others, different characters expess doubt and alternative opinions. We are not just force-fed Schopenhauers bleak opinions. I think that the book does two things, firstly it criticises psychotherapy for ignoring the fagitily and inherent weakness/ anxieties of the human condition. Our proplems are not all the result of individual neurosises. At the same time it highlights the fact that philosophical speculation on how we should live and how we view the world are heavily influenced by individual concerns, and personal past-experiences. This is just an overview, its well worth reading the book to find as it touches on subjects relevant to everyone. Yalom has created a book that any mere biped can understand, but leaves no easy answers.

Fascinating Until the Very End, 07 Aug 2005
As a psychiatrist, now newly retired, who has read most of Yalom's books, including his standard textbook on group therapy, I knew more or less what to expect in terms of the descriptions of group process. What surprised me was the heavy interlarding of both biography and exegesis of the pessimistic and misanthropic Schopenhauer, surely one of the least understood and oft-lampooned philosophers -- I'm reminded of that line from one of Ira Gershwin's lyrics: "My evenings were sour/Spent with Schopenhauer" -- whose writings are quoted, in translation, extensively to make certain points. As one of the group's participants says late in the book, the quotations are highly selected to make a certain kind of point, and many of Schopenhauer's other writings that contradict those quotations are conveniently passed over. Still, it's a daring literary conceit and one that Yalom very nearly pulled off. One certainly admires his daring is attempting it.

As a novel, one comes to care for the characters -- with some exceptions -- and the story carries one along. Unfortunately, the last fifty pages or so feel arbitrary, casually tossed off, and thus disappointing. One senses that Yalom cares for his characters, toward the end, as little as Schopenhauer cared for 'human bipeds,' to use his term.

I am glad to have read this novel. Yalom is an interesting writer. I do wish it had been better edited, though.

Two ways of confronting the problems of relationships, 31 Oct 2008
Yalom is a psychotherapist who practises not only individual but also group therapy, and this novel is about the situation in a group therapy setting. After Julius Hertzfeld, the therapist, has been diagnosed with a fatal disease, he asks himself what in life he has achieved and where he has failed. He seeks out Philip Slate, a former patient of his of many years ago with whom he had failed, in order to find out whether after all some part of the therapy had been useful to Philip. It turns out that Philip, a cold fish if ever there was one, is training to be a therapist himself, though what he plans to offer is philosophical therapy, based on the teachings of Schopenhauer. But to qualify he needs a professional supervisor. Julius thinks Philip is totally unqualified to help others, but he agrees to act as his supervisor provided Philip first attends his group therapy sessions - partly because he hopes that he might succeed in helping Philip this time where he had failed previously. Philip offers to tutor him in Schopenhauer's philosophy in exchange, which Julius is not particularly interested to learn about: Julius believes that a rounded life requires warm human relationships and an affirmation of life, whereas Schopenhauer and his disciple Philip believe that wisdom requires you to detach yourself from human relationships and to come to terms with the ephemerality of life and to see that, sub specie aeternitatis, almost everything which seems important to us and about which we worry - attachments to things and to people, to love and to hate, and above all any concern about what other people think of us - is in fact quite insignificant. Philip at times seems to be taking over the group, dishing up Schopenhauerian advice which most members lap up.

Julius, like the therapist in Yalom's brilliant earlier book, Lying on the Couch [see my review], has problems of his own, which also become a subject for the group's discussions. He has told the group about his fatal melanoma, and so his impending death - and of attitudes to death in general - are frequently touched upon.

Once you accept the somewhat unlikely premise of the bargain between Julius and Philip, the book works very well. The characterizations are excellent. I don't myself have experience of group therapy, but I thought the dialogue during the sessions was very convincing, and towards the end is very cathartic. What I found particularly interesting is that, though Julius often asked the crucial questions, the other members of the group learnt to do this as well. For this, what is needed is not only a developing emotional intelligence, but an intellectual intelligence also, and it is clear that all the members of that group - even the one who was `uneducated', possessed it. Julius himself calls it `high-powered'.

The narrative is interspersed with chapters about Schopenhauer's life and aspects of his work, presented not by Julius or Philip, but by Yalom, with the occasional psychological interpretation and the firm conclusion that this brilliant but aggressive and solitary man, with whom Philip so closely identified himself, would certainly be a candidate for psychotherapy were he alive today. On the other hand Schopenhauer's insights anticipate so much of later Freudian theory that - even if, in Yalom's view, there can really be no `Schopenhauer Cure' - the author obviously has considerable respect for him. Schopenhauer's view of life is a defence, a wall behind which unhappy men and women may shelter for a while; but walls cut you off from real life. And in his last writings even Schopenhauer softened his bleak view and his insistence on isolation.

Look what they've done to my brains, ma... , 10 Sep 2007
If you happen to be of the opinion that:
a) Life is a pretty unpleasant experience, full of silly cravings, boredom and suffering;
b) This world really does not offer much comfort, rather resembling, as Hamlet would say, "a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours" (and this was before humans were surrounded by factories and roads!);
c) Most (if not all) human beings you meet are not only incredibly dull but full of unrealistic opinions and expectations...

Well then, look no further, Yalom has got just the cure for you! (Not that you had thought you were ill, of course, but believe us, you are!) In his wonderfully enlightening novel you can learn all about your true ailment. However sane (and soothing) your ideas may appear to yourself, if they aren't upbeat and optimistic and full of hope, then oh dear, you are an antisocial character in urgent need of help!
Yalom offers a very easy solution for your anomaly: group therapy. All you have to do is expose yourself to hour-long superficial chattering sessions with a bunch of strangers about their private little expectations and frustrations (as if one didn't get enough of that day in and day out). This, the experienced psychiatrist turned novelist explains, will help you understand just how WRONG you are. Forget about centuries of wisdom - from Buddha through Aristotle to the infamous Schopenhauer - that might in any way support your endeavour to distance yourself from the banalities and pains of everyday life. After all, as Yalom will gladly prove to you, those great sages lived in the awful past, when there was poverty and hunger and toil and wars and violence and hatred and ignorance - things we have long overcome, as you have surely noticed (if not, you're obviously reading/watching questionable things). What you need is to appreciate the elevating powers of human contact: such as evenings spent with your pals in a crowded bar, drinking beers and discussing the Giants (metaphysical issues are so passé!); or ever exciting emotional involvements with people who just crave to give you some love (never mind what that's supposed to be).

The highly therapeutic way in which Yalom chooses to prove just how lonely one may end up being if one indulges in the slightest negative thoughts regarding the company of other bipeds is quite astonishing and does deserve some careful reading: by creating a highly antisocial, arrogant and detached character supposedly resembling a modern-day Schopenhauer, the author shows us step by step the uselessness of following that great philosopher's wise advice in order to make life (slightly) more bearable. Confronting this (quite superficial) Schopenhauer-like character with a wonderfully caring psychotherapist plus his entourage of regularly confused but life-loving patients, Yalom's novel actually provides a very good example of the power of group-enforced conformity. Indeed, in the hands of this helpful bunch of astonishingly appealing one-dimensional characters, our protagonist undergoes a great transformation, gradually distancing himself from the most down-to-earth, but alas unappetizing, teachings of his supposed master, Schopenhauer.
You see, that German philosopher really was a cranky chap. Reading Yalom's novel will in fact provide you with countless quotations from his works, as well as a pretty good overview of his life. Sure, he was a genius and influenced many other brains (such as Nietzsche, Cekhov, Freud, Thomas Mann). But Yalom concludes also that Schopenhauer was an unhappy human (as compared to the rest of us, apparently) who could have well used a heavy dose of therapy to cure him from his dreadful pessimism and socio-phobia! Unfortunately for him (but very fortunately for his readers/followers), the wonderful business of psychotherapy had still not been invented back then. So our friend the philosopher was doomed to content himself with thinking and writing.
We are only so lucky nowadays that we can resort to doctors as soon as the slightest feeling of spiritual discomfort sets in. And there's even rumour of an anti-pessimism pill being manufactured as we speak... Schopenhauer no more!

But just in case you are mad enough to actually want to hold on to your negative views (at your own risk!), I would strongly advise you to skip this book and go to the sources instead: Schopenhauer's "Counsels and Maxims" is not only a great introduction to his wise words, but just about indispensable for anyone interested in understanding the roots of our sufferings (and how to deal with them). And Rudiger Safranski's "Schopenhauer and the Wild Years of Philosophy" will provide you with a much more accurate (and less judgemental) portrait of this amazingly realistic philosopher's life and influences.


A must for anyone interested in group psychotherapy, and a good read too, 22 Dec 2006
The Schopenhauer Cure may not be the great novel that When Nietsche Wept is but it is a brilliant text. As a fictional account of group therapy at its best, it offers excellent insights into group dynamics and the way that a skillful group analyst can guide and encourage them to unfold. There are sections of the book that read like therapeutic versions of Plato's Symposium, where the dynamics of the characters, enable them to discover voices within themselves that they would not have known otherwise.

The book's central character, Dr Julius Hertzfeld, a group analyst with a year to live makes his final year of weekly meetings with a group of patients his last will and testament. The accounts of what goes on during these sessions are utterly compelling, the best feature of the book. The presence in these group sessions of a patient from Hertzfeld's past, Philip Slate (a meaningful name for those familiar with 'microcosms'), a self-confessed sex addict who found solace and a cure for his addiction in the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer, is what gives them their unforgettable quality. Slate does not preach Schopenhauer, he lives him or at least tries to do so. The presence in the group of a victim of Slate's earlier addiction makes forces Slate to put his philosophy of life to the test. In the course of the therapy sessions, we rediscover the central characters afresh, share some of their preoccupations and struggles.

Two features of the book left me with more mixed feelings. The account of Julius, a man who has a year of life, is not as rich as that of the other characters. He comes across through the idealizing lenses through which his patients see him, or maybe Irvin Yalom, a fellow-psychotherapist, choses to portray him. When all patients confess a hidden part from their past, Julius, prompted by Philip, also makes a confession but it seems anodyne and defensive to the point where even cursory self-analysis would suggest that much more is hiding there. Julius's idealization of his dead wife also seems to conceal more than we are let in on. His attempt to live with the knowledge of imminent dying is only half-developed in the novel. What, however, is excellently portrayed is how his patients learn to live with their therapist's death, without experiencing him as a 'corpse', someone contact with whom is painful or embarrassing.

The other thing I found somewhat less compelling are the chapters that take us back to the life, thought and work of Schopenhauer. As a genre, it reminded me of Kundera's, episodic return to the world of Goethe in Immortality, but it does not work so well. Schopenhauer is a curious philosopher - I am not sure that anyone can get to know him through these brief excursions into his life. A misanthrope who came to advocate compassion, a fame-hunter who excoriated fame, a truly great thinker who disclocated Western philosophy from its firm pedestal of LOGOS and sought to relocate it on the WILL, he needs far more time and patience to understand than is available to Yalom. All the same, this is a formidable achievement and a must for anyone interested in group psychotherapy.

Yalom reached a target, I couldn't see, 18 Apr 2006
I found it hard to put this book down. I read it in evey spare moment, until it was finished. Philosophy often poses the queston, 'how should we live'. The beauty of this novel, is it weaves many different perspectives on this question. Firstly it has the lives of the characters in the theapy group. How they are attempting to change themselves based on the fact that, how they act in a therapy group situation, is how they will act in the real world. If they can analyse and change, how they act in the group they can identify their problems and combat them. Secondly Yalom uses a character Philip Slate as modern day version of Arthur Schopenhauer. He becomes a mouthpiece for the philosophy of Schopenhauer, focusing on how Schopenhauer thought we should live and his pessimistic account of human existence. To add a futher dimension, biographical accounts of Schopenhauer's life are added and selected quotes begin each chapter. Although certain view-points are seen more sympathetically than others, different characters expess doubt and alternative opinions. We are not just force-fed Schopenhauers bleak opinions. I think that the book does two things, firstly it criticises psychotherapy for ignoring the fagitily and inherent weakness/ anxieties of the human condition. Our proplems are not all the result of individual neurosises. At the same time it highlights the fact that philosophical speculation on how we should live and how we view the world are heavily influenced by individual concerns, and personal past-experiences. This is just an overview, its well worth reading the book to find as it touches on subjects relevant to everyone. Yalom has created a book that any mere biped can understand, but leaves no easy answers.

Fascinating Until the Very End, 07 Aug 2005
As a psychiatrist, now newly retired, who has read most of Yalom's books, including his standard textbook on group therapy, I knew more or less what to expect in terms of the descriptions of group process. What surprised me was the heavy interlarding of both biography and exegesis of the pessimistic and misanthropic Schopenhauer, surely one of the least understood and oft-lampooned philosophers -- I'm reminded of that line from one of Ira Gershwin's lyrics: "My evenings were sour/Spent with Schopenhauer" -- whose writings are quoted, in translation, extensively to make certain points. As one of the group's participants says late in the book, the quotations are highly selected to make a certain kind of point, and many of Schopenhauer's other writings that contradict those quotations are conveniently passed over. Still, it's a daring literary conceit and one that Yalom very nearly pulled off. One certainly admires his daring is attempting it.

As a novel, one comes to care for the characters -- with some exceptions -- and the story carries one along. Unfortunately, the last fifty pages or so feel arbitrary, casually tossed off, and thus disappointing. One senses that Yalom cares for his characters, toward the end, as little as Schopenhauer cared for 'human bipeds,' to use his term.

I am glad to have read this novel. Yalom is an interesting writer. I do wish it had been better edited, though.

Excellent but flawed in style, 08 Feb 2008
In all honesty, I give this book just short of 4 stars. It is an excellent book and well worth reading. And like the 2007 film adaptation, it's as equally fascinating and flawed.

The film in comparison is flawed in that it attempts to squeeze an awful lot into a 100 minute running time. The book is flawed in that what it has in insight, it lacks in literary style and voice. The characters of Nietzsche and Breuer become little more than mouthpieces of psychology and analysis in action. Of course, that is a strong part of the book, but it sacrifices any real shading to the characters and neither of them has their own independent voice outside of the author's.

Another minor flaw (tackled as clumsily in the film adaptation) is a very important hypnosis scene. I won't go into details here and spoil the narrative, but where as in the film it feels a 'cop out', in the book it borders on almost dismissive. Again, this is down to Yalom's cut and dried (almost naive?) style of exposition.

And yet, despite these flaw, the book is a gripping read. The real joy comes in unravelling the obsessions (thus fears) of both protagonists, and in turn, your own self. In fact, there's very little in this book you cannot identify with and graced with moments of genuine emotion that moved this reader to tears more than once.

In a strange way, the film and the book are almost companion pieces. One succeeds where the other falls, and it is to Yalom's credit that, despite the flaws, his book is a genuinely moving account of friendship, reclaiming the self and 'amor fati'.

An ideal book for those feeling lost in their own lives or having just emerged from a broken relationship. Excellent, but like I said, give the film a try as well...

Emotionally probing read, 19 Aug 2007
A fictional account of the meeting of two great historical minds from the fields of psychology and philosophy.
This book is a clever, insightful texts that autopsies a consumptive obsession and delves into the depths of human emotion and the mind; an interesting read tackling the eternal questions of love and the meaning of life.

An extraordinary read, 23 Sep 2004
Dr Yalom's novel is set in Vienna at the end of the 19th century, on the eve of the birth of psychoanalysis. The main characters are the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, Dr Joseph Bauer, one of the founders of psychoanalysis, and a then young (the year is 1882) medical intern called Sigmund Freud. As these protagonists discuss their ideas, preoccupations and frustrations, they create an original plot of a fictional relationship between an exceptional analysand and a talented analyst. As the fictional dialogue between Breuer and Nietzsche unfolds, the reader becomes aware of the fact that at this epoch it must have been the first time that a doctor realised that what mattered is not what a patient said but that he said it. These were truly the first steps towards psychotherapy. Breuer's task was not made easy by Nietzsche's character. His social fears and his misanthropy made him select an impersonal and distant style. His tone was often harsh and brittle, particularly when he talked about his deceptive lover, Lou Salomé, a woman Nietzsche actually met in the spring of 1882. The unpleasant experience he had with this one and only love affair made him resentful towards women. He felt that they corrupted and spoiled him, he avoided them because he thought that he was ill suited for them. This partly explains Nietzsche's total isolation, his feeling of belonging nowhere, having no lover, no circle of friends, no home, no family hearth, his life sounding like a hollow echo.
A wonderful achievement showing sad and troubled characters in an intriguing cross-discussion of philosophy and emerging psychotherapy, yet as gripping to read as a detective story.

SAD TO HAVE FINISHED IT !!, 26 Jul 2004
Having just finished this amazing book I feel compeled to add a line. It has been a long time since a book took over my whole and outmost interest. I just had to make up time to read it. Now that its finished I feel sad as If I miss a great friend. I reccomend it to all, especially MEN...

Intellectually Challenging and Personally Meaningful, 30 Nov 2002
This is one of the most intellectually stimulating, personally relevant, important books I have ever read. What a rare treat Yalom has given the world. That being said, this book may not be for everyone (but what is?). In many ways, I feel as if this novel was written just for me, and I feel sure that many other readers likewise come away feeling the book was written especially for them. Do you have to know Nietzsche in order to enjoy this book? You do not, but it will certainly appeal to you more if you do. I approached this book purely as a Nietzsche admirer, and I worried that my favorite philosopher might be portrayed poorly or unacceptably in its pages. In fact, he was not. No one can say whether this fictional treatment of Nietzsche is a true depiction of this great man, but it really does not matter. The importance of this book comes not through the descriptions of its characters, but from the meaning you as an individual take from its themes. These themes are grand and universal, the themes that Nietzsche addressed in his factual life--the meaning of life, fear of aging and death, each person's place in society, and both aloneness and loneliness. Everyone knows these themes, the emotions they stir up, the doubts they employ as daily hurdles on the living of one's life, the truly cosmic loneliness that each individual knows and combats at some point or points in his/her life. Not everyone can face these challenges or even acknowledge them; those who cannot will do well to stay away from this book.

What a joy it is to read a truly intellectually challenging work in these modern times. Don't read this book to be entertained. Read this book to seek understanding of life and your place in it. I cannot stress enough how personal the message of this book seems to be. In the final pages, Nietzsche revealed to Dr. Breuer his one great fear, and that fear was my own great fear, expressed in words that described it better than I ever could. I had to put the book down momentarily and just say "My God . . ." That gave this book incredible meaning for me. I should say that I did not come away overjoyed or overly burdened from the experience of finishing the book, but I certainly came away more in tune with my own thoughts and my own philosophy, challenged to remain steadfast in my own intellectual thoughts and pursuits, and buoyed (yet not elated) to know that at least one other person on earth has knowledge of the intellectual and emotional struggles that I sometimes resigned myself to believe were solely my own.

Please, do not start reading this book unless and until you are ready to devote yourself to it and to yourself. The first few chapters are not gripping and do not really offer a visionary glimpse of the meaning and magic of the book. The early conversations, particularly between Nietzsche and Breuer, are sometimes rather stilted and "phony." Do not be discouraged in the early stages of the read because intellectual stimulation and personal challenge await you soon thereafter, and I believe that you will find yourself hard pressed to stop reading until the very end. More importantly, the book will remain with you even after you have placed it back on the shelf. That is the greatest praise that a novel can be given.