Is There No Place on Earth for Me? (Paperback)

by Susan Sheehan (Author) "Shortly after midnight on Friday, June 16, 1978, Sylvia Frumkin decided to take a bath..." (more)
Key Phrases: nurse management team, typing workshop, goo milligrams, Miss Frumkin, Sylvia Frumkin, Transitional Services (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
" A brilliantly documented chronicle of young woman's long struggle with schizophrenia."

-- Willard Gaylin, The New Republic

"Sylvia Frumkin," highly intelligent young girl, became a schizophrenic in her late teens and spent most of the next seventeen years in anti out of mental institutions. Susan Sheehan, a talented reporter followed "Sylvia" for almost a year talking with and observing her listening to her monologues, sitting in on consultations with doctors, even for a period sleeping in the bed next to her in a mental hospital.

"Susan Sheehan has committed an extraordinary act of journalism....She brings relentless intelligent attention to bear on a particular case, a journalistic practice that almost always results in new and disturbing insights into those mindless generalities and prejudice and certitudes we tend to carry around with us." -- Meg Greenfield, front page Washington Post Book World

"Sheehan is tenacious, observant and unsentimental. The history of a single patient leads us into a maze of understaffed institutions, bureaucratic fumbling, trial-and-error treatment and familial incomprehension. Though Sheehan keeps herself invisible, her sympathy is palpable."

-- Walter Clemons, Newsweek

By the author of Lift for Me Ain't Been No Crystal Stair

From the Inside Flap
" A brilliantly documented chronicle of young woman's long struggle with schizophrenia."

-- Willard Gaylin, The New Republic

"Sylvia Frumkin," highly intelligent young girl, became a schizophrenic in her late teens and spent most of the next seventeen years in anti out of mental institutions. Susan Sheehan, a talented reporter followed "Sylvia" for almost a year talking with and observing her listening to her monologues, sitting in on consultations with doctors, even for a period sleeping in the bed next to her in a mental hospital.

"Susan Sheehan has committed an extraordinary act of journalism....She brings relentless intelligent attention to bear on a particular case, a journalistic practice that almost always results in new and disturbing insights into those mindless generalities and prejudice and certitudes we tend to carry around with us." -- Meg Greenfield, front page Washington Post Book World

"Sheehan is tenacious, observant and unsentimental. The history of a single patient leads us into a maze of understaffed institutions, bureaucratic fumbling, trial-and-error treatment and familial incomprehension. Though Sheehan keeps herself invisible, her sympathy is palpable."

-- Walter Clemons, Newsweek

By the author of Lift for Me Ain't Been No Crystal Stair

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Vintage; 1 edition (May 12, 1983)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0394713788
• ISBN-13: 978-0394713786
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.3 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #235,445 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Look Inside the Mind of a Schizophrenic, December 5, 1999

By	Patti None (New York, USA) - See all my reviews

"Is There No Place on Earth For Me" is a telling tale of the life of a Schizophrenic. Sheehan goes inside the mind of the character to explore the inner workings and provide detailed accounts of what life is like for someone suffering with Schizophrenia and the hell their life can become. Sheehan at one point, even slept in the bed next to her character in the mental institution. This act assures not only a detailed account, but also an accurate one. Sheehan reinforces the old saying...Don't knock Charlie till you walked a mile in his shoes! This book takes you through many miles in a Schizophrenics shoes. It extricates vivid details of the inner mind and its workings. This is a book you will never forget. After reading this story, you will never look at mental illness in the same light again.

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good journalism, April 29, 2001

By	"elljay" (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews

A Pulitzer Prize-winner for General Nonfiction, this is an account of the tragic life of one "Sylvia Frumkin" (a fictitious name), who succumbed to schizophrenia while still an adolescent and spent the next two decades in and out of mental hospitals.

The author (who lived with Frumkin for a time) never appears "on stage" in the book, and restricts herself to just-the-facts third-person narration. A certain moral outrage is evident nonetheless. The mental health industry does not come off well at all (Frumkin's institution is unfavorably compared to the one depicted in "One Flew Over a Cuckoo's Nest"). It's difficult not to come away with the impression that a little less bureaucratic negligence might have saved Miss Frumkin many wasted years. Fortunately, this is not a one-sided screed (not quite, anyhow): some of these medics and bureaucrats are just doing the best they can with the limited resources on hand.

The prose style is plain and straightforward--maybe a little flat-footed, too. But overall, the book is a good example of how facts can speak for themselves.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Revolving Door of Schizophrenia, April 30, 2005

By	Melissa Solomon (Victoria, TX United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Reading this book is like watching a train wreck in progress. You can't take your eyes off of it because you want to know how it all works out. When I was putting together a course on psychology in literature a friend gave me this book but made me promise to return it because it was a favorite of hers. After reading it, I can understand why. The author does a fantastic (although disturbing) job of describing the life of a woman with schizophrenia while also discussing the impact that the woman's illness has on her family. While reading the book the reader often begins to feel the anxiety and frustration experienced by Sylvia, a woman with schizophrenia, and her family, and can see in their mind's eye how the disease unfolds and engulfs their lives.
This is a great text for a student of psychology who is interested in descriptions of the disease and also of historical (1970s) views of the mental health system. It would also be helpful for the family members of a person diagnosed with schizophrenia to read so that they can have a greater understanding of the life of a person affected by the disorder.