In Defense of Schreber: Soul Murder and Psychiatry.

Lediglich der Schutzumschlag ist berieben, sonst ein gutes und sauberes Exemplar / Only the dust jacket is rubbed, otherwise a good and clean copy. - In late October of 1893, the presiding Senatsprasident of the High Court of Saxony, Daniel Paul Schreber, began to suffer insomnia and at the urging of his wife, Sabine, sought the help of Dr. Paul Emil Flech- sig, Director of the Psychiatric Clinic of the University of Leipzig, who had successfully treated Schreber for depression nearly a decade earlier. Thus began a series of events that led to Schreber�s nine-year hospitalization and ultimately to the publication of his classic Memoirs of My Nervous Illness. Retracing the steps of Schreber�s descent into madness, Zvi Lothane offers a stunning reappraisal of the case that overturns virtually all previous opinion. Incorporating extensive new archival and bibliographic researches, In Defense of Schreber goes beyond Schreber�s text to examine both the man and his milieu in a way that allows the reader fresh access not only to the tragedy of Schreber�s illness but also to his heroic, if doomed, attempts to come to terms with his condition through his writing. In the process, Lothane demonstrates persuasively that important issues of both psychiatric diagnosis and psychoanalytic interpretation have heretofore been compromised by a failure to pay sufficient attention to Schreber�s interpersonal, cultural, and historical context. At the center of Lothane�s reappraisal is his discovery of crucial pieces of the historical puzzle�the personalities and theories of Schreber�s two psychiatrists, Flechsig and Guido Weber. From his struggle with Weber, Schreber derived the inspiration to recast the meaning of his madness in forensic terms, thereby winning his release and also establishing an important legal precedent. But it is the relationship with Flechsig, Lo- thane argues, that provides the key to many of Schreber�s delusions, here reinterpreted as a sensitive man�s attempt to capture all the subtleties of a therapeutic relationship that tragically misfired. The sweep of Lothane�s scholarship does not stop here. From his careful reexamination of the writings of Schreber�s father, through his insights into the role of Schreber�s wife in Schreber�s continued hospitalization, to his documentation of the burgeoning antipsychiatry movement in Germany at the turn of the century, Lothane takes the reader on a richly documented tour of all the ingredients that, in combination, made Schreber�s illness a unique psychiatric event. The result is a book with profound relevance to contemporary psychiatric and psychoanalytic approaches to the psychoses. It will stand as the definitive text on Schreber and the nature of his psychosis for years to come. / Contents Acknowledgments List of some abbreviations used in this book 1. Man in Search of a Soul 2. Paul Schreber�s Story 3. The Life and Legacy of Moritz Schreber 4. Moritz Schreber�s Philosophy of Medicine and Education 5. Paul Flechsig and the First Biological Psychiatry 6. Guido Weber and the First Antipsychiatry 7. How Others Interpreted Schreber 8. Schreber as Interpreter and Thinker 9. The Dreams and Dramas of Love Appendix: Paul Schreber�s Clinical Chart References Index. ISBN 9780881631036