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The quest for Wilhelm Reich

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As a fan of Colin Wilson and a person with an interest in Wilhelm Reich, I was delighted to find a used paperback of this in a bookstore. Throughout the text Wilson brings forth a picture of a brilliant, but increasingly egocentric man. He finds fault in Reich's personality without letting this color his opinion on the work itself. A definite must-have for Reich researchers and enthusiasts.

There's no question Wilhelm Reich was a paranoid whose disease escalated into a full blown perecution mania. The question is whether the most colorful of Freud's "heir apparents" actually discovered something of vital importance before going nuts.

Colin Wilson argues that he did. Reich followed the 'scientific method' to the letter, starting with experiments involving microbes and working up to UFO's.

Skeptics argue that his cultures must have been contaminated, and that time lapse photography showing stars moving but unknown objects standing still during the night are inconclusive.

But the hidden argument is that one shouldn't trust a madman, no matter what his methodology may be. Which is rather beside the point, especially when Reich was not alone. Others corroborated his results. Were they deluding themselves as well?

Wilhelm Reich had an atypical childhood. As a teenager he caught his mother having an affair and, after a delay which might have involved an attempt to sexually blackmail her, he finally informed his father. His mother committed suicide. Hardly a promising beginning for a psychotherapist.

Yet he rose from the ranks by his genius to become Freud's number one apostle, a post 'vacated' by Jung.

Freud was pained by reductionist charges ('Is there ANY mental illness that doesn't involve repressed sex, herr doctor? ) and documented clinical cases to justify his arguments to his critics. He demanded and expected all of his followers to back him up.

Reich backed him up with a vengeance, he became even more of a reductionist than Freud---in itself no mean feat! But he added a strange spin, which to Reich seemed the next logical step of Freud's sexual theory.

Colin Wilson recounts that Freud was essentially a classical pessimist. He believed human beings were the playthings of the gods and fates ( re-named the 'ID' and the 'Death Wish'). On the other hand, Reich was a romantic optimist who believed that the libido had supreme healing power.

He was a throwback to Bergson's 'Life Force' and Mesmer's 'Animal Magnetism'.
With Reich, orgasms not only cured everything from neurosis to warts, they produced "Orgone Energy" the vital building block of life in the universe!

...P>
An enjoyable and illuminating biography that credits Reich for advances in psychology, especially his discovery of 'Character Armor'

Wilson documents many cases in which half an hour of Reichian therapy produced better result than months of classical psychoanalysis.

Perhaps someone, somewhere should submit his more outlandish claims to crtical study?

Is there a scientist in the house?