Anger, Madness, and the Daimonic: The Psychological Genesis of Violence, Evil and Creativity (Suny Series in the Philosophy of Psychology) (Paperback)

~ (Author), Rollo May (Foreword) "We live in violent times..." (more)
Key Phrases: existential depth psychology, eudaimonic genius, daimonic passions, Rollo May, New York, Carl Jung (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

Anger, Madness, and the Daimonic explores the origin of anger and rage and how they can be canalized into constructive activity. This provocative book masterfully handles a complicated topic and ends with the credo that "the indomitable human will and spirit to survive, create...and bestow meaning is the only sensible response to...violence and evil." -- AHP Perspective, September/October 1997

In Anger, Madness, and the Daimonic clinical psychologist Stephen Diamond considers the ancient Greek concept of the daimonic as a unified life-force with potential for both good and evil, in an effort to revitalize our psychology of human evil, psychopathology, and creativity. Diamond argues for the use of existential depth psychology as the most promising approach to dealing with daimonic tendencies in individuals and society. ...bear(s) reading and rereading and, I feel certain, will continue to reward readers who wish to have their most deeply felt ideas challenged at nearly every turn. -- The Quest, September 1997 --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description

Explores the links between anger, rage, violence, evil, and creativity and describes a dynamic therapeutic approach that can help channel anger and violent impulses into constructive and creative activity.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 440 pages
• Publisher: State University of New York Press; 1 edition (1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0791430766
• ISBN-13: 978-0791430767
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #514,837 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required reading for understanding anger and creativity., June 9, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Anger, Madness, and the Daimonic: The Psychological Genesis of Violence, Evil, and Creativity (S U N Y Series in the Philosophy of Psychology) (Hardcover)

You hear of it almost daily, the mayhem. A building is dynamited in the name of some high-sounding cause. A gang sprays a street corner with bullets. Children bring hunting rifles to school. A comic's wife kills him, then herself.

For a country drenched in violence I can't imagine a book more timely than "Anger, Madness, and the Daimonic: The Psychological Genesis of Violence, Evil, and Creativity" (SUNY Press, 1996). Having counseled violent men and teens court-referred for mandatory therapy, I can state my reaction to the book in two words: read it.

Building on the work of Rollo May, Carl Jung, Sigmund Freud, and other well-known theorists, Dr. Stephen A. Diamond has brought to the exploration of our violence epidemic his experiences as a psychotherapist and forensic psychologist. He also draws on art, literature, philosophy, and comparative religion to reveal the roots of rage.

Those roots are, to use the classical expression, daimonic, a term also favored by James Hillman. Anger is a natural, dynamic reaction to woundedness, injustice, violation, powerlessness. When repressed and denied, however, anger ferments into a neurotic, narcissistic rage, which itself gets repressed until it explodes. You cannot banish a vital facet of yourself without suffering consequences. The executive who jumps out a window, the postal worker who comes to work with a pistol, the celebrity who one day massacres a mate are not necessarily insane: we all cast shadows, and everyone who stuffs down anger for too long is at risk. (My work with violent men has repeatedly shown me that the passive, "it doesn't bother me" gentlemen in denial of how angry they really are routinely reviolate and return to jail.)

And what are psychotherapists doing about the rage epidemic? In some cases unknowingly boosting its virulence. By medicating or misinterpreting anxiety, irritability, conflict, or other symptoms of repressed anger, a symptom-oriented psychotherapy-increasingly the only kind p! aid for by insurance companies --can actually become one more weapon for banishing the daimonic from consciousness, thereby rendering it incapable of transformation. Dr. Diamond is clear that a model of persons that focuses only on growth, healing, and wholeness but not on passivity, irresponsibility, or victim-thinking does all of us a disservice and reinforces the widespread denial and false optimism that help turn daimonic anger into demonic destructiveness.

Dr. Diamond points out that managing our anger and rage involves respecting and relating consciously to our daimonic impulses, acting creatively rather than acting out. Creativity is not a skill or a gift, however, but a way of being that is open to everyone with the courage to make constructive use of the dark side-within. For the daimonic, as Rollo May and Paul Tillich and the ancient Greeks well knew, is by nature also creative, and only by tapping its vitality can we humanize its destructive potential, brother to the mayhem all around, into what Nietzsche referred to as "light and flame."

How do we do it? Read the book and find out.

Craig Chalquist, M.S.

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An important work, December 5, 2002

By	JPP - See all my reviews

I am a clinical psychologist, and in my list of favorite books, I write this:

Diamond writes: "The volatile emotions of anger and rage have been broadly `demonized,' vilified, maligned, and rejected as purely pathological, negative impulses with no real redeeming qualities. As a result, most `respectable' Americans habitually suppress, repress, or deny their anger-inadvertently rendering it doubly dangerous." He also clarifies, while developing the ideas of Rollo May, how we therapists collude with our clients and culture, thus depriving ourselves of the value and resources of this normal dimension of our being. He integrates psychoanalytic, Jungian, and existential theory under a new rubric of Existential Depth Psychology. As May states, our job is often "not to still the daimons but to wake them."

In addition, I think this is an important, engaging, and well-written work that I wish all my colleagues would read.

4.0 out of 5 stars "Penetrating", September 6, 2009

By	Veritvs "Veritvs" (Mondvs) - See all my reviews

Anger,Madness and the Daimonic by Stephen A. Diamond is to me a valid work on a valid subject. The subject of Daimonic has intrigued me since I read it discussed by Rollo May and authors such as Alan Watts , Rollo May, Paul Tillich, Carl jung and others contributed much to this subject and are referenced here. My opinion is that self knowledge is indespensibe and the ancients in their own genius had much to reveal in the classical world of Greece and Rome which is also digested here. Christianity as I see it has alienated us from our classical organic self perceptions and also from our roots in nature. In so doing has created psycosis within us by confusing the Diamonic with what Cristianity calls Demonic. Thus the witch trials and the like. True wisdom, I think is a relational process between the individual and the mysteries he wrestles with to understand and I think this book is a comliment to this and finally I think Diamond drags Psychology to the ground placing responsibility on individuals for their own behavior.