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Psychobiography is the study, through a psychological lens, of influential and important figures in history, politics, literature, and other fields. A psychological approach is necessary to reveal what moves and motivates these people. Many psychobiographies have been faulty because they throw psychological jargon at their subjects and treat them simplistically. Anderson shows how to study psychobiographical subjects sensitively and compellingly.
List of contents
- Chapter 1 Introduction: In Search of the Inner Life
- Chapter 2 Research, the Foundation of Psychobiography
- Chapter 3 Research Materials of Special Value to the Psychobiographer
- Chapter 4 The Relationship of Psychobiographers with Their Subjects
- Chapter 5 The Relevance of Culture to Psychobiography
- Chapter 6 Use Psychological Theory, Don't Let It Use You
- Chapter 7 Narrative Identity for Psychobiographers (written with Dan P. McAdams)
- Chapter 8 Analysis and Interpretation in Psychobiography
- Chapter 9 Psychobiography of Literary Artists
- Chapter 10 Executing Psychobiography: The Case of William and Henry James
- Chapter 11 Why Might a Psychobiography Go Wrong?
- References
- Index
About the author
James William Anderson is Professor of Clinical Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Northwestern University. There he teaches courses on Personality Psychology and the Psychology of Film. He also serves on the faculty of the Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute. He received degrees from Princeton University, Harvard University, and the University of Chicago. For several decades, as a licensed clinical psychologist, he has conducted psychotherapy. In his research, he focuses on psychobiography and has published pieces on William and Henry James, Abraham Lincoln, Edith Wharton, Sigmund Freud, Anna Freud, D. W. Winnicott, Woodrow Wilson, and Frank Lloyd Wright.
Summary
Biographies are at their best when they convey that the subject is a three-dimensional human being who possesses an inner life. Psychobiography: In Search of the Inner Life offers tools for using psychological approaches when writing biography.. A leader in the field, James William Anderson, analyzes the effective use of psychology and what can go wrong, such as treating the biographical subject reductively, and failing to account for both historical and cultural context. Anderson recommends using psychology to open up, not close down; to provide new questions, not easy answers; to complicate, not simplify.
His lively inquiry into the art of biography--with its vignettes about people such as Oprah Winfrey, Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, Henry James, Simone de Beauvoir, Edith Wharton, and Anaïs Nin--will appeal to all readers who are curious about the lives of fascinating personages.
Additional text
James Anderson's book makes a compelling case for the revitalization of psychobiography, a genre that has sometimes been accused of formulaic applications of dogmatic psychoanalytic concepts. By contrast, Anderson's wide-ranging study counsels the use of contemporary, post-Freudian theory, sensitivity to culture, and understanding of authors' relationships with the people they write about. The result is an approach that gets at the complexities of inner life. Among many contributions to the understanding of culture, Psychobiography: In Seach of the Inner Life offers valuable insights into literary artists and the psychodynamics of creativity.
