Customer Reviews

The Empty Fortress: Infantile Autism and the Birth of the Self

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

Bettelheim wrote his book just before the massive surge in research into the biological and neurological origins of autism. It is now agreed by all autism researchers that autism is biological in origin, and has nothing to do with the parents' behaviour at all - cold and rejecting or abusive parents produce emotionally disturbed kids, not autistic ones, as Bettelheim claimed. Exhaustive studies have shown that the parents of autistic children are not distinguishable on any psychological measure from the parents of normal children. There is in fact general agreement that there is a substantial genetic factor - cases of identical twins where only one has autism (in fact very rare) simply show that the genetic factor is not 100% and there is also a role for factors such as viral damage, brain damage at birth, etc. Leo Kanner, who first identified autism as a syndrome, liked to refer to Bettelheim's book as "The Empty Book".
(...) I highly recommend Richard Pollak's brilliant expose "The Creation of Dr. B."
Many high-functioning autistic people such as Temple Grandin and Donna Williams have also spoken out against psychoanalytic "interpretations" as having absolutely nothing to do with their experience (indeed many people with high-functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome can be reduced to helpless laughter or tears of fury by reading "The Empty Fortress".
Ultimately, the fact that "The Empty Fortress" still has its defenders among psychoanalysts is a damning statement about the psychoanalytic profession and its inability to admit mistakes (hmm, I wonder what that says about their unconscious motivations?).

Yes, this book is of historical interest, in the same sort of shameful way that lobotomies are of historical interest. Bettelheim's success rate was mostly fabricated. There is good evidence that he abused the troubled children in his care. (See, for example, the evidence in "The Creation of Dr. B" by Richard Pollack). Primarily he was a charlatan, able to pull the wool over the public's eyes in large part because he practiced in the fuzzy field of psychoanalysis, with its near absence of scientific rigors. The book is evidently lots of fun for people who have never had to deal with real mental illness. It's appallingly cruel to parents of autistic children, particularly the mothers.

This book is useful for those studying the history of child psychology and autism, since Bettelheim's theory that parents caused autism was so influential for so long, but anyone reading the book should be aware that his theory has been discredited. Books like I Want To Hear Your Voice, by Catherine Maurice, and The Siege, by Clara Claiborne Park, are far more likely to be useful for those who have an autistic family member (both books are by mothers of autistic children).

Empty Fortress by Bruno Bettelheim was just another example of the ways in with Bettelheim fabricated evidence, to further his own view that autism is the result of a Freudian 'wish this child was dead' belief at the conscious or unconscious level.

It should also be remembered that he produced this book to justiy his lack of reports on the progress of a project he had been paid an enormous amount of money to undertake.

Nature versus the environment; a valid debate in any area of human science, but this manifestly corrupt contribution is of historical value in much the same way that a fake Da Vinci is.

Looks good, until you scratch the surface, with anything like decency or common sense.

I read this for a graduate course on the History of Autism. It was my own idea; so I can't blame anyone else. And I did get an A.

It was pure torture to read about how parents, mothers in particular, were blamed for causing autism by allegedly being cold. Oh, and then there's the part about individuals with autism as concentration camp prisoners who have given up.

It's also so poorly written that reading it - subject matter aside - was torture of a far lesser kind. But torture as well. Bettelheim worried that he was not a very good writer. He was correct.

Somehow I couldn't get this published with no stars. But it shouldn't have any.

Bettelheim died almost twenty years ago, discouraged because his theories were harder and harder to uphold in the face of mounting scientific evidence against them.

This book is still in print because he had built up a formidable persona as a Dr. Strangelove-type expert on autism. Considering that his experience and training in autism turned out to be largely fabricated, that his former students were terrified of him, and that his self-reported good results were not provable, it is a mystery that he still has a reputation, among those not familiar with autism, as an expert.

Bettelheim was a brilliant writer who comes across in his books as compassionate, but was arrogant and cruel in person. He did immense harm to families of autistic people, and the harm is still happening. Families are still being told today, in 2007, that they caused their child's autism. This is the legacy of "Brutalheim." Note that he had no evidence whatever that his theories were correct; they were obviously correct because they were Freudian! Talk about circular thinking.

This book is part of the long sad history of dangerously harmful pseudo-science.

This is shocking example of pseudo-science and blaming parents for everything. The man was a charlatan!

It's important that readers of this extremely dangerous and destructive book realize that not only the theories but the man himself have been completely debunked. Almost everything he said about himself and his work was a lie.

Bettelheim did not have three Ph.D.s as he said (he had one -- in "asthetics"); never studied psychoanalysis at all, much less under the eminent teachers he claims to have studied with; never met Freud, much less was praised by him; was not released from a concentration camp by Eleanor Roosevelt's intervention (his family bought his way out); was not a member of the anti-Nazi resistance; never took "several" (or any) autistic children into his home whom he then "cured"; regularly hit and abused the children he DID have under his care in his "Orthogenic School" and on and on. All of this came to light after his suicide in 1990. Don't believe a word this book says until after you do the research.

I can't tell you how dismayed I was as I read reviews supporting the content of this book. The information presented in the Empty Fortress is not based on sufficient data and does not use an experimental design to support its premises. It has done damage to individuals with Autism and their families.

My personal experience - my brother , who is now 50 , was diagnosed at age 3 by a student of Leo Kanner ( by my mother's report). The intervention - my parents went to a group counseling session weekly . There were only a few individuals identified as having ASD at that time, so the group was comprised of people with a diagnosis which had required them to be hospitalized . The second intervention was a weekly one hour counseling session with my brother. My brother's communication was then limited to less than 10 2-3 word phrases.

I read this book for the 1st time when I was 13 or 14. I'm sure my comprehension was spotty at that point but I do remember my confusion as I tried to apply the information to my own family. I was also fascinated by the descriptions of the children involved, as I knew no other children who ran around the backyard for hours wearing a Superman cape, who cried and screamed because a Christmas present wasn't the same color as the one pictured in the catalog, or who couldn't talk at age 8.

Bruno Bettleheim absolutely contributed a chapter to literature addressing Autism, at a time when little information was available.
My concern is that this book might continue to cause damage, as people looking for information are directed to interventions which
are not evidenced based , and others are led to credit Autism to parents who are already overwhelmed by the continuous
need for structure and direction required to raise their child (childen). Over my 30 years of experience, I have seen parents who make many mistakes, and others who embrace every new therapy as the possible breakthrough. I have seen every parent turn
lives upside down in accomodating or responding to the needs of their child with Autism.

Confession- in younger days I hid this book in two libraries behind stacks of other books. Later when I was of course much wiser, I wrote a note and left it in the front of the book directing a reader to other books which stood beside it

What I really wanted to do was to add a huge warning label- "For Historic Research Only", in red on the cover.

Rating - 5 as a good, fascinating read and a historical reference. Content if viewed as science- not defensible.

Parents and relatives of children with autism would do themselves a lot of good by picking another book on autism. This one misses the mark entirely