The Creative Self: Beyond Individualism

by Mari Ruti, Gail M. Newman

Winner, 2025 Choice Outstanding Academic Title

“Be the best you can be!” Practically from the moment we are born, we are taught to optimize our lives—to devote ourselves to increasing our productivity and efficiency, which, we are told, will make us happier and more successful. The imperative of constant self-improvement, however, drains us dry even as it promises to build us up.

The Creative Self delves into the hegemony of neoliberal self-optimization and turns to psychoanalysis in search of an alternative. In paired chapters, Mari Ruti and Gail M. Newman examine the works of the psychoanalysts Marion Milner and Donald W. Winnicott. They provide deeply personal accounts of how these thinkers resonate with day-to-day life, exploring modes of selfhood that subtly but profoundly resist the lure and escape the trap of competitive individualism. Milner urges us to relinquish the ego in the face of loss and lack, and Winnicott asks us to accept the paradoxes of the self instead of demanding their resolution. Together, their insights help us flourish where neoliberal self-improvement would stifle us. Combining the intellectual, the personal, and the political from two perspectives that converge and diverge in striking ways, this book offers an antidote to transactional individualism and envisions forms of creative living beyond its confines.

305 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 21, 2025

About the author

Mari Ruti is Distinguished Professor of critical theory and of gender and sexuality studies at the University of Toronto in Toronto, Canada. She is an interdisciplinary scholar within the theoretical humanities working at the intersection of contemporary theory, continental philosophy, psychoanalytic theory, cultural studies, trauma theory, posthumanist ethics, and gender and sexuality studies.

Reviews

[Päivi Metsäniemi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mari Rutin postuumisti julkaistu, yhdessä Gail Newmanin kanssa kirjoittama kirja luovuudesta kapitalistisessa järjestelmässä. Olen rakastanut Mari Rutin kirjojen selkeää, havainnollista ja uutta ajattelua herättävää kirjoitusta hänen muissa kirjoissaan, ja sitä saadaan nytkin, mutta ei ihan yhtä viimeistellysti - ilmeisesti työ on jäänyt kuitenkin jollain tavalla kesken, kun Ruti pari vuotta sitten kuoli syöpään.

Tässä kirjassa kirjailijat tarkastelevat Marion Milnerin ja David Winnicottin käsityksiä luovuudesta osana ihmisyyttä, ja erityisesti luovuuden ja kapitalistisen ajattelun välistä ristiriitaa, joka tulee ilmi ennen kaikkea hyödyn ja voiton tavoittelussa, josta luovan toiminnan pitäisi pystyä sanoutumaan irti. Ajatukset ovat raikkaita, syvällisiä ja kiinnostavia. Mutta jos et jaksa lukea koko kirjaa, kuuntele tämä mainio podcast, jossa Gail Newmania haastatellaan kirjan kirjoitusprosessista - ihanaa kuunneltavaa!: https://soundcloud.com/podcast-co-coo...

[Anum Ammad · Rating 3 out of 5]

Creativity as a concept is quite close to my heart and so is creative living. Hence, this book The Creative Self: Beyond individualism by Gail Newman and Mari Ruti was a quick pick for me.

About the book, I would say it is the kind of book that you would read and then reread to get more and more understanding of the concepts. The main premise is about the antidote towards neoliberal self optimization in form of creative living. The book does have the vibe of academic writing. So when some concepts are simple, there are some where one needs to do some more reading too.

I would like to thank Netgalley for the advance digital copy of this book in exchange of an honest review.

[Apatheia · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found the Mari Ruti half of this book to be more interesting than the Newman half.