Customer Reviews

The Father: Historical, Psychological and Cultural Perspectives

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Every once in a while, one finds a book that justifies a hardback cover. The Father, historical, psychological and cultural perspectives by Luigi Zoja, translated into English from the Italian by Henry Martin is such a book. This Jungian analyst's work will become a rewarding companion, returned to and consulted by specialists and laypersons. It is a dense, thought-provoking hive of considerations on the role of males in evolution, and more specifically, males in society in the evolving role of father. It is such a generous book, so full of ideas and explorations, connections and implications, that one can go back, not just to review arguments but to develop one's own questions in terms of western literature and myth, biology and history, about a topic which is so often now only seen as a function of mothering.
It is important that this book, weighted with the scholarship and experience of a Jungian analyst with a deep and broad classical training, has been freed through translation to circulate in the international world. In this very moment when men are again resorting to definitions of themselves as warriors, many insights about the power and evolution of the father in western culture could help us to see where we are headed from a psychological standpoint. Zoja makes us realize the power and pathos, the long and never completely secure terms in the invention of this role.
The book, starting from prehistory and proceeding to the present father searching for definition, reminds us of how specific culture is and how deep it runs. Zoja's chapters on Greek fathers--Hector, Ulysses, and Aeneas--are stunning intellectually as well as being revelations of underground springs feeding us today. He points to their life-giving truths, while not forgetting their heavy chains.
I hope that this book spreads by word of mouth as well as reviews. It is one of those rare discoveries so rich that one does not go there to haggle about differences, but to absorb the many insights that can inform and expand one's own thinking about roles of men and women in today's often shallow and technical debates of political correctness.

Every page carries not just one, but several, revelations - new ways to think about, to relate to, synthesize and ultimately help understand our fascinating biological and cultural heritage as men and as fathers, and novel approaches to perceiving our own complex identities in the brave unfolding present. Bravo! The book is often slow-going and dense, but this is quibbling. What's the rush? To be fair, to fulfill its ambitions would require it to be very, very full. Terrific stuff.