The Creative Mystique: From Red Shoes Frenzy to Love and Creativity [Paperback]

Susan Kavaler-Adler (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0415914132 | ISBN-13: 978-0415914130 | Publication Date: August 22, 1996 | Edition: First Edition

Through the life stories of women such as Camille Claudel, Virginia Woolf, Katherine Mansfield, Anne Sexton, Suzanne Farrell and others and through clinical case studies, Susan Kavaler-Adler offers penetrating insights into the nature of the creative process. Kavaler-Adler contrasts unsuccessful psychological treatments with object-relations therapy that is able to resolve the pathological narcissism of creative addiction and allow the emergence of healthy modes of self-expression.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Object-relations psychotherapy is the theoretical basis for Kavaler-Adler's approach to how women may develop healthy creative selves. Expanding on ideas examined in The Compulsion to Create, Kavaler-Adler highlights the lives of such outstanding artists as Camille Claudel, Virginia Woolf, and, more recently, Diane Arbus. Suzanne Farrell and the ballerina's relationship with George Balanchine is cited as a successful "fantasy of union with a muse," in contrast to the destructive tendencies of others in the study who were never able to overcome "an unstable sense of self . . . from early trauma." From an analytical viewpoint, perhaps most fascinating is a critique of Anne Sexton's therapy with various doctors; Kavaler-Adler speculates on care that might have helped rather than hindered the poet, who eventually capitulated to the suicidal demands of her darker self. Compelling reading for all who remain curious as to why gifted artists often suffer the worst despair. Alice Joyce

Review

Kavaler-Adler . . . comes across as a gifted analyst who uses object relations methods, mourning processes and empathy, to heal her women patients. We see the powerful influence of psychotherapy, helping women make the transition from being the isolated victims of their own joyless and addicted creativity, to using creativity as a pathway to spontaneity and authenticity. . . . The focus on the uniqueness of creativity for women artists is timely and welcome. . . . The book will be of interest to therapists involved in dynamic psychotherapy and especially to those interested in object relations. It will also appeal to readers interested in the psychological aspects of creativity, and the life histories of these women. It may also be used in teaching advanced clinical psychotherapy, as a lively illustration of object relations theory.
–Journal of Analytic Social Work

. . . an amalgam of theoretical and clinical brilliance brought to life through the medium of the psycho-biography. For the clinician it is a lodestone of clinical wisdom, of intuitive genius brought to bear on the treatment situation.
–Althea Horner, Ph.D.

This is the second in a series of works by the author on the creative process, and it maintains the fascination and profundity in the earlier one. Dr. Kavaler-Adler has uniquely integrated the Otherness (the muse) of the creative process in women with the exciting and alluring and yet rejectingly intrusive chimerical male figure in the female artist's internal mental world to create the virtually archetypal-universal concept of the demon lover. In so doing, the author spans the horizon of the Kleinian, Object Relations, and Developmental literature, on one hand, and the artistic/literary biographical literature on the other. The effect is compelling and riveting. The concept of the demon lover offers yet a different window into the psychoanalytic exploration of the creative process.
–James S. Grotstein

Compelling reading for all who remain curious as to why gifted artists often suffer the worst despain.
–Booklist

...Kavaler-Adler highlights the lives of such outstanding artists as Camille Claudel, Virginia Woolf, and, more recently, Diana Arbus...perhaps most fascinating is a critique of Anne Sexton's therapy with various doctors....
–Booklist

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; First Edition edition (August 22, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415914132
• ISBN-13: 978-0415914130
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,853,174 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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