Shakespeare as Prompter: The Amending Imagination and the Therapeutic Process - Softcover

Cox, Murray; Theilgaard, Alice

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1853021598 ISBN 13: 9781853021596

Publisher: Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 1994

Synopsis

Prompting is the thematic thread that pervades the pages of this book. Its primary connotation is that of the prompter who is urgently called into action, at moments of anxiety, when narrative begins to fail. The central dynamic issue concerns the amending imagination as a prompting resource which, through creativity and the aesthetic imperative, can be invoked in this therapeutic space when the patient - through fear, resistance or distraction - is unable to continue with his story. Psychotherapy can be regarded as a process in which the patient is enabled to do for himself what he cannot do on his own. Shakespeare - as the spokesman for all other poets and dramatists - prompts the therapist in the incessant search for those resonant rhythms and mutative metaphors which augment empathy and make for deeper communication and which also facilitates transference interpretation and resolution. The cadence of the spoken word and the different laminations of silence always call for more finely tuned attentiveness than the therapist, unprompted, can offer. The authors show how Shakespeare can prompt therapeutic engagement with "inaccessible" patients who might otherwise be out of therapeutic reach. At the same time, they demonstrate that the clinical, off-stage world of therapy can also prompt the work of the actor in his on-stage search for representational precision.

About this title

From the Author

Murray Cox M.A.F.R.C.Psych.M.Inst.G.A.(Hon) was Consultant Psychotherapist at Broadmoor Hospital from 1970 to 1997. He edited Shakespeare Comes to Broadmoor and Forensic Psychotherapy: Crime Psychodynamics and the Offender Patient (jointly with Christopher Cordess) and wrote Shakespeare as Prompter and Mutative Metaphors in Psychotherapy with Alice Theilgaard, all published by Jessica Kingsley. Alice Theilgaard Dr.Med.Sci. Cand.Psych. Professor of Medical Psychology, The University of Copenhagen. She is Honorary Research Fellow, The Shakespeare Institute, The University of Birmingham.

Review

...a delightful read... The authors demonstrate the value of the 'aesthetic imperative within the therapeutic space when narrative begins to fail'; they show with rich examples how therapists become prompters - prompted themselves by Shakespeare... Within this clearly written, intelligent, witty narrative, they present clinical examples along with the richness of Shakespeare's 'prompts' which can open up the therapist's imagination and deepen the emotional dialogue with the patient. Author: American Journal of Psychiatry

This book is a way of writing about psychotherapeutic matters missed since Jung. Author: Nord J Psychiatry

The book is a tour de forceÿ20...powerful, challenging and scholarly...an exhilarating glimpse into the working reality of two practitioners...a most impressive book...richly stimulating text. Author: British Journal of Guidance and Counselling

Edition details

• Publisher: Jessica Kingsley Publishers
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 1853021598
• ISBN 13: 9781853021596
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 480