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The Incurable Romantic: And Other Tales of Madness and Desire
"Writer and subject were rarely better matched. This is a brilliant, compelling book."--Ian McEwan
In The Incurable Romantic, Frank Tallis recounts the extraordinary stories of patients who are, quite literally, madly in a woman becomes utterly convinced that her dentist is secretly infatuated with her and drives him to leave the country; a man destroys his massive fortune through trysts with over three thousand prostitutes--because his ego requires that they fall in love with him; a beautiful woman's pathological jealousy destroys the men who love her. Along the way, we learn a great deal about the history of psychiatry and the role of neuroscience in addressing disordered love. Elegantly written and infused with deep sympathy, The Incurable Romantic shows how all of us can become a bit crazy in love.
In The Incurable Romantic, Frank Tallis recounts the extraordinary stories of patients who are, quite literally, madly in a woman becomes utterly convinced that her dentist is secretly infatuated with her and drives him to leave the country; a man destroys his massive fortune through trysts with over three thousand prostitutes--because his ego requires that they fall in love with him; a beautiful woman's pathological jealousy destroys the men who love her. Along the way, we learn a great deal about the history of psychiatry and the role of neuroscience in addressing disordered love. Elegantly written and infused with deep sympathy, The Incurable Romantic shows how all of us can become a bit crazy in love.
292 pages, Kindle Edition
First published June 6, 2018
119 people are currently reading
2147 people want to read
About the author
Frank Tallis
45 books394 followersAka F.R. Tallis.
Dr. Frank Tallis is a writer and clinical psychologist. He has held lecturing posts in clinical psychology and neuroscience at the Institute of Psychiatry and King's College, London. He has written self help manuals (How to Stop Worrying, Understanding Obsessions and Compulsions) non-fiction for the general reader (Changing Minds, Hidden Minds, Love Sick), academic text books and over thirty academic papers in international journals. Frank Tallis' novels are: KILLING TIME (Penguin), SENSING OTHERS (Penguin), MORTAL MISCHIEF (Arrow), VIENNA BLOOD (Arrow), FATAL LIES (Arrow), and DARKNESS RISING (Arrow). The fifth volume of the Liebermann Papers, DEADLY COMMUNION, will be published in 2010. In 1999 he received a Writers' Award from the Arts Council of Great Britain and in 2000 he won the New London Writers' Award (London Arts Board). In 2005 MORTAL MISCHIEF was shortlisted for the Ellis Peters Historical Dagger Award.
Dr. Frank Tallis is a writer and clinical psychologist. He has held lecturing posts in clinical psychology and neuroscience at the Institute of Psychiatry and King's College, London. He has written self help manuals (How to Stop Worrying, Understanding Obsessions and Compulsions) non-fiction for the general reader (Changing Minds, Hidden Minds, Love Sick), academic text books and over thirty academic papers in international journals. Frank Tallis' novels are: KILLING TIME (Penguin), SENSING OTHERS (Penguin), MORTAL MISCHIEF (Arrow), VIENNA BLOOD (Arrow), FATAL LIES (Arrow), and DARKNESS RISING (Arrow). The fifth volume of the Liebermann Papers, DEADLY COMMUNION, will be published in 2010. In 1999 he received a Writers' Award from the Arts Council of Great Britain and in 2000 he won the New London Writers' Award (London Arts Board). In 2005 MORTAL MISCHIEF was shortlisted for the Ellis Peters Historical Dagger Award.
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October 8, 2019
The first chapter tells the story of Megan, a middle-aged barristers’ clerk, and her one way love affair with her dentist Dr Verma, and it suddenly smashed into my brain that this was a perfect metaphor of how monotheistic religion works.
Megan visits a new dentist who performs a complicated extraction. During these visits Megan falls in love with Dr Verma and at the same time believes he has fallen in love with her. This is monotheism – the believer does not simply believe in God (that doesn't seem unreasonable to me) but believes that God is a loving God who loves the believer back. Frank Tallis recalls asking Megan :
"How did you know that Dr Verma had fallen in love with you?"
"I just knew"
"Yes, but how?"
"I just knew."
Getting nowhere, he rephrases the question.
"So what were your reasons for believing that Dr Verma had fallen in love with you?"
"It’s not something you can analyse."
And later :
"I couldn’t stop thinking about him. And I could sense him thinking about me. "
Now, Megan was married. Her husband clearly represents the tribal gods that were abandoned in favour of monotheism. Of course it also turns out that Dr Verma is happily married. I’m not quite sure how this fits into the metaphor, but let’s proceed.
Now that she is no longer needing to see him for any further tooth extractions, Megan phones Dr
Verma and proposes that they meet to discuss their situation.
"And how did he respond?"
"He pretended he didn’t understand. I persevered but he was evasive. He made some excuse and hung up."
Just like God. He won’t meet up with his believers at an agreed time either, whether it’s at a chic French restaurant in Chelsea or at Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day. The silence of God can be disheartening for the believer. But the true believer will point out that faith is faith, not certainty.
So Megan wasn’t discouraged.
She phoned Dr Verma repeatedly, sometimes several times a day. The dental secretaries –
(I take those to be angels)
The dental secretaries became frosty and asked her to stop… Megan wrote letters to Dr Verma every day;
(I take these to be scriptures)
long, detailed letters suggesting solutions, begging him to recognise that their love could not be disowned or denied.
Dr Tallis then reveals that Megan was suffering from de Clerambault’s syndrome, first described in 1921 (but recognised for centuries).
Typically, the affected individual falls in love with a man with whom she has had little or no prior contact and comes to believe that he is also passionately in love with her… This perception arises in the absence of any actual encouragement. The man is often older, of a higher social status, or a celebrity… A hapless and unwelcome pursuit follows which is experienced by the victim as extreme harassment.
Megan took to hanging around outside the dentist’s surgery on all day vigils
Sometimes he would see her and send his secretary out with a message: go home. Megan didn’t argue. What was the point? She smiled, and nodded, and made her way back to the tube station. It didn’t matter, not in the grand scheme of things, because ultimately, her patience would be rewarded.
When the poor dentist can’t take it anymore, he and his family relocate to Dubai. Megan is devastated, but her love endures. She builds a shrine to the absent dentist in her house. It’s a box containing a single news clipping (he attended a gala dentist event), a business card, a pen and a few paperclips from his office. She tells Dr Tallis :
"I like to be on my own in the early evening because I know that in Dubai he’s just gone to bed and he’ll be lying in the dark without any distractions. … And he’ll know that I’m thinking about him – and then he’ll start thinking about me – and we’ll both be thinking of each other… and it’s like… it’s like we’re one.”
Megan visits a new dentist who performs a complicated extraction. During these visits Megan falls in love with Dr Verma and at the same time believes he has fallen in love with her. This is monotheism – the believer does not simply believe in God (that doesn't seem unreasonable to me) but believes that God is a loving God who loves the believer back. Frank Tallis recalls asking Megan :
"How did you know that Dr Verma had fallen in love with you?"
"I just knew"
"Yes, but how?"
"I just knew."
Getting nowhere, he rephrases the question.
"So what were your reasons for believing that Dr Verma had fallen in love with you?"
"It’s not something you can analyse."
And later :
"I couldn’t stop thinking about him. And I could sense him thinking about me. "
Now, Megan was married. Her husband clearly represents the tribal gods that were abandoned in favour of monotheism. Of course it also turns out that Dr Verma is happily married. I’m not quite sure how this fits into the metaphor, but let’s proceed.
Now that she is no longer needing to see him for any further tooth extractions, Megan phones Dr
Verma and proposes that they meet to discuss their situation.
"And how did he respond?"
"He pretended he didn’t understand. I persevered but he was evasive. He made some excuse and hung up."
Just like God. He won’t meet up with his believers at an agreed time either, whether it’s at a chic French restaurant in Chelsea or at Westminster Abbey on Christmas Day. The silence of God can be disheartening for the believer. But the true believer will point out that faith is faith, not certainty.
So Megan wasn’t discouraged.
She phoned Dr Verma repeatedly, sometimes several times a day. The dental secretaries –
(I take those to be angels)
The dental secretaries became frosty and asked her to stop… Megan wrote letters to Dr Verma every day;
(I take these to be scriptures)
long, detailed letters suggesting solutions, begging him to recognise that their love could not be disowned or denied.
Dr Tallis then reveals that Megan was suffering from de Clerambault’s syndrome, first described in 1921 (but recognised for centuries).
Typically, the affected individual falls in love with a man with whom she has had little or no prior contact and comes to believe that he is also passionately in love with her… This perception arises in the absence of any actual encouragement. The man is often older, of a higher social status, or a celebrity… A hapless and unwelcome pursuit follows which is experienced by the victim as extreme harassment.
Megan took to hanging around outside the dentist’s surgery on all day vigils
Sometimes he would see her and send his secretary out with a message: go home. Megan didn’t argue. What was the point? She smiled, and nodded, and made her way back to the tube station. It didn’t matter, not in the grand scheme of things, because ultimately, her patience would be rewarded.
When the poor dentist can’t take it anymore, he and his family relocate to Dubai. Megan is devastated, but her love endures. She builds a shrine to the absent dentist in her house. It’s a box containing a single news clipping (he attended a gala dentist event), a business card, a pen and a few paperclips from his office. She tells Dr Tallis :
"I like to be on my own in the early evening because I know that in Dubai he’s just gone to bed and he’ll be lying in the dark without any distractions. … And he’ll know that I’m thinking about him – and then he’ll start thinking about me – and we’ll both be thinking of each other… and it’s like… it’s like we’re one.”
September 9, 2021
There's something a little bit chilling about a clinical psychologist who imagines he can plunder his case files for a fast buck. You'd like to think these dozen patients (who managed to muster up the courage to share their private agonies with a professional) had given permission to use their sufferings in such a manner - yet their former therapist freely admits he hasn't had contact with the majority of them in years. And so, you know, fair game I guess. Only not. Only really not.
Frank Tallis has cobbled together a series of "tales" about the trouble some people experience with love and attraction. Topics include obsession, delusion, jealousy, denial, the psychotic break and the pedophile. This is a prurient piece of work, styled very much in the vein of a tabloid recounting, replete with the standard dose of cavalier insensitivity - which one suspects our therapist has long mistaken for analytic objectivity. Frequent detours are taken to explore the relevant psychological theories, if only from the shallow end of the pool. None here were helped by their visits to Dr. Tallis, though he assures us such is a common result...
"Even though psychotherapy can be a challenging occupation and many patients don't get better, there is always a possibility, however slim, that treatment will be successful."
And if not? Well, hell, there just might be a book in all of this.
Frank Tallis has cobbled together a series of "tales" about the trouble some people experience with love and attraction. Topics include obsession, delusion, jealousy, denial, the psychotic break and the pedophile. This is a prurient piece of work, styled very much in the vein of a tabloid recounting, replete with the standard dose of cavalier insensitivity - which one suspects our therapist has long mistaken for analytic objectivity. Frequent detours are taken to explore the relevant psychological theories, if only from the shallow end of the pool. None here were helped by their visits to Dr. Tallis, though he assures us such is a common result...
"Even though psychotherapy can be a challenging occupation and many patients don't get better, there is always a possibility, however slim, that treatment will be successful."
And if not? Well, hell, there just might be a book in all of this.
June 22, 2018
Books centred around clinical cases are polarising for me. I either love them or hate them. When done well, they feed my desire for narrative and redemption in real life. When done poorly, they just remind me that medicine is mainly messy and unrewarding, time spent following Voltaire's advice to 'amuse the patient while nature takes its course'.
I'm not sure which side of the equation this book falls on, for the simple reason that Tallis brings up what is apparently his central 'argument' only in the final chapter of the book. Apparently what he's been trying to say is that we the people should take love and its attendant miseries more seriously as medical/psychological issues. I find this extremely pertinent, as a doctor who would daily like to prescribe people fresh air, a pet, and a subscription to Match.com. However, I feel he failed to mention this at all prior to the last chapter, and all the individual chapters don't tie into any central theme, let alone this.
However, each case was individually interesting and Tallis certainly holds up the other requirement to make these books palatable, that of being a crisp and confident writer. There's a few minor points at which it's clear he hasn't interrogated all his own privileges - for example, when he says of fetishes that stockings and shoes are common as compared to kettles because they recall the 'soft skin of women'. He appears to have forgotten, or doesn't know, that women are naturally as hairy as men. He doesn't mention the historical precedent, but if stockings existed as a fetish before the twentieth century it can't be because of women's smooth legs, because they weren't.
There are some great thinking points:
...ultimately the selflessness of ordinary mothers makes the whole of civilisation possible.
Accurate! Also, preach!
Romance has been characterised as the most significant belief system in the Western psyche.
Alfred Adler, who wisely observed, "The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well."
Which is a comforting thought.
I'm not sure which side of the equation this book falls on, for the simple reason that Tallis brings up what is apparently his central 'argument' only in the final chapter of the book. Apparently what he's been trying to say is that we the people should take love and its attendant miseries more seriously as medical/psychological issues. I find this extremely pertinent, as a doctor who would daily like to prescribe people fresh air, a pet, and a subscription to Match.com. However, I feel he failed to mention this at all prior to the last chapter, and all the individual chapters don't tie into any central theme, let alone this.
However, each case was individually interesting and Tallis certainly holds up the other requirement to make these books palatable, that of being a crisp and confident writer. There's a few minor points at which it's clear he hasn't interrogated all his own privileges - for example, when he says of fetishes that stockings and shoes are common as compared to kettles because they recall the 'soft skin of women'. He appears to have forgotten, or doesn't know, that women are naturally as hairy as men. He doesn't mention the historical precedent, but if stockings existed as a fetish before the twentieth century it can't be because of women's smooth legs, because they weren't.
There are some great thinking points:
...ultimately the selflessness of ordinary mothers makes the whole of civilisation possible.
Accurate! Also, preach!
Romance has been characterised as the most significant belief system in the Western psyche.
Alfred Adler, who wisely observed, "The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well."
Which is a comforting thought.
May 31, 2020
Knižka trošku z iného súdka. Páčilo sa mi nahliadnutie do hlavy psychológa a jeho stretnutí s pacientmi, ktorí sa boria s láskou v rôznych podobách. Z literárneho hľadiska to zrejme nie je žiadne terno, no veľmi som si čítanie užila, tak to prevýši subjektívne všetko. Často som premýšľala nad účastníkmi príbehov a záverom mi z toho vyšlo, že v každom z nás sa skrývajú tajomstvá a nevyslovené bloky, ktoré si v sebe nosíme od detstva a odrážajú sa v celom našom živote. Veď ako hovorí Alfred Adler: "Jediní normálni ľudia sú tí, ktorých dobre nepoznáte."
March 22, 2019
The premise of this book was intriguing, but it failed to live up to its promise. From the beginning, I found myself rolling my eyes at the writing. There were huge amounts of irrelevant or pointless information: extensive detail about patients' appearance, an explanation of how doctors dictate referrals and how they are then processed and by whom, flowery prose, the use of full names to refer to an individual (dozens of times, over the course of a few pages), lengthy discussion of the history of various theories (not all of them related in any way to psychology) and so on. I kept highlighting passages and noting, "is he trying to reach a word-count requirement?"
As a professional, his responses he describes to patients often seemed odd and self-aggrandizing: he makes frequent judgements or assumptions about patients due to their age, their educational achievements or their sexual experiences. I frequently frowned at his behaviour - e.g. he mentions how, every day, there are patients who don't show up for appointments, which means that "a psychotherapist spends many hours hanging around, drumming fingers, checking wall clocks and staring out of windows" - not writing up notes or dictating reports, making calls or keeping up-to-date with professional journals? Really?
When the book seemed to morph into a bizarre autobiography/self-analysis/horror-spoof in which the author described a dramatic, life-threatening situation in which he'd been involved many years earlier (as a non-professional), with the apparent goal of showing how well he took control of this situation (yet inexplicably failed to contact the police or instruct anyone else to do so), and when he then decided that the behaviour of the individual responsible was due to religious belief and/or sexual frustration - that's when I decided that I couldn't justify giving this any more of my time. DNF at about 60%.
As a professional, his responses he describes to patients often seemed odd and self-aggrandizing: he makes frequent judgements or assumptions about patients due to their age, their educational achievements or their sexual experiences. I frequently frowned at his behaviour - e.g. he mentions how, every day, there are patients who don't show up for appointments, which means that "a psychotherapist spends many hours hanging around, drumming fingers, checking wall clocks and staring out of windows" - not writing up notes or dictating reports, making calls or keeping up-to-date with professional journals? Really?
When the book seemed to morph into a bizarre autobiography/self-analysis/horror-spoof in which the author described a dramatic, life-threatening situation in which he'd been involved many years earlier (as a non-professional), with the apparent goal of showing how well he took control of this situation (yet inexplicably failed to contact the police or instruct anyone else to do so), and when he then decided that the behaviour of the individual responsible was due to religious belief and/or sexual frustration - that's when I decided that I couldn't justify giving this any more of my time. DNF at about 60%.
July 10, 2018
“What is life if it isn’t about love? Finding love, being loved and loving others? Yet, love is something we rarely engage with intellectually. We all experience falling in love but take little or no interest in how it works.”
Frank Tallis, a British clinical psychologist, takes upon himself the onerous task of discovering how love works when madness and/or desire take over. Dr. Tallis looks at this topic from all angles – from inappropriate attachment to love addiction, from obsessive jealousy to pedophilia and narcissus. Some of the tales are haunting: the woman with de Clerambault’s syndrome who becomes totally obsessed with her dentist, becoming a factor in his fleeing to Dubai…the beautiful interior designer whose extreme and unwarranted jealousy drives her loved one to distraction…the successful man in mid-career who squanders his fortune on over 3,000 prostitutes …the dowdy widow whose relationship with her loved one was based on an all-encompassing desire for physical intimacy.
The stories turn us into voyeurs-of-sorts, peeking over the psychologist’s shoulder. Dr. Tallis tempers that feeling by divulging information from the history of the art and science of psychology – from Sigmund Freud’s famous case history off Anna O to the background of demonic possession to various DSIM diagnoses and how they came to be.
He obviously has his mass audience in mind—do not expect more than a cursory look at the theories of psychology. At times, Dr. Tallis strays from his chosen focus: we learn, for example, anecdotes from his own life and are privy to tales that seem less about love addiction and more about dysfunction in general. The parts, in this case, are more intriguing than the whole.
July 13, 2018
Someone, anyone could probably successfully argue this book is not about love. It’s about mental illness. It’s about obsessions and addictions and delusions and narcissism. Fortunately, our tour guide through those loveless states, Dr. Frank Tallis, a clinical psychologist, appears to be a compassionate and sane man, unlike some other psychologists who write books. This is his second book on the topic, too; the first being Love Sick: Love as a Mental Illness; so he is well acquainted with the matter. Nevertheless, when all was said and done, I found myself not agreeing with him on some major matters, besides the loose use of the word love.
Mainly, I think he was wrong to state that what happened to some of the patients in the book could happen to any one of us. Really? Like De Clerambault's Syndrome? Isn’t that rare? While that case was one of the most interesting ones in the book, it was still sort of an unsatisfactory story. Megan, a middle-aged woman with a good job and a kind husband, wakes up from oral surgery one day madly obsessed with her oral surgeon. When asked later if she had felt anything for him before the surgery, she answered possibly, but she was not certain. She apparently didn’t behave in an obsessed manner before the surgery. Yet at no point, even in hindsight, did Dr. Tallis suggest the possibility that the general anesthesia damaged her brain.
Instead, as a psychotherapist, he thought talking about the obsession might lead to a cure. It did not. (Neither did medication.) He could find nothing in her background, or her current life, that could explain why she thought her dentist was madly in love with her, and why she started to stalk him. (Do note the word “incurable” in the book’s title. It’s there for a good reason.) So what is the reader left with? The doctor simply saying Megan was incurable, and suggesting that her obsession was simply a magnification of the irrational thinking and actions associated with being “love-struck”. Hence, any one of us could end up like Megan if “love-struck”.
I’m afraid I found his conclusions a bit worrisome. (They are particularly worrisome if teenagers, or others prone to irrational fears, are reading this book.) As stated earlier, De Clerambault’s Syndrome is rare. If it could happen to any one of us, it would not be rare. While it’s possible Dr. Tallis’ compassion led him to make such a statement, I’m not certain of that; since the last paragraph about Megan had him saying he lost touch with her, but still thought about her; imagining her going home, taking an object out of her dentist shrine box, “closing her eyes and communing with a man who has probably forgotten that she exists by now.”
How dramatic. And how maddening. Although it’s refreshing to see the doctor is not an arrogant man who refuses to reveal his failures, he seemed to be too accepting of the fact that people like poor Megan are incurable; that there wasn’t anything missed about her life, or her brain activity, that could have been discovered, and could have unlocked the chain to her obsession. She just ends up a sad woman and a sad story in his book. (It’s interesting to note that besides writing about psychology, Dr. Tallis is also a successful novelist. Maybe he should save his sad images of the future of his patients for his novels.)
It’s not that I refuse to accept that some, if not many, mentally ill individuals end up “incurable”, or that absolutely no one is immune to mental illness, but that I feel Dr. Tallis too strongly suggests that someone can suddenly go off the deep end. Mental illness does not work like that, unless there is a brain problem involved. In addition, the doctor’s suggestion that we might have less free will than we think is once again him suggesting we have little or no control over our own mental health. When in reality, what usually determines mental health are all the decisions one makes every day of one’s life, starting at a very young age. Many of these decisions aren’t even remembered, but they were still made.
Love or hate? Be fearful or brave? Forgive or hold a grudge forever? Drink or do drugs or not? Tell the truth or lie? Take responsibility or blame someone else? Turn outward or remain self-absorbed? Empathy or self-pity? Bad past decisions, like bad past experiences, don’t always doom someone, either. Newer, better decisions can start being made any day of the week. Sometimes I think some psychotherapists actually like the idea that anyone could easily become mentally ill, or everyone is mentally ill to a point, because they need the work; or want to think their work is indispensable to mankind; or maybe because they are mentally ill themselves. Or maybe they just want to reduce the stigma of mental illness by suggesting anyone and everyone can easily go off the deep end, and they have no control over that happening or responsibility for it. That fortunately is not true.
(Note: I received a free ARC of this book from Amazon Vine.)
Mainly, I think he was wrong to state that what happened to some of the patients in the book could happen to any one of us. Really? Like De Clerambault's Syndrome? Isn’t that rare? While that case was one of the most interesting ones in the book, it was still sort of an unsatisfactory story. Megan, a middle-aged woman with a good job and a kind husband, wakes up from oral surgery one day madly obsessed with her oral surgeon. When asked later if she had felt anything for him before the surgery, she answered possibly, but she was not certain. She apparently didn’t behave in an obsessed manner before the surgery. Yet at no point, even in hindsight, did Dr. Tallis suggest the possibility that the general anesthesia damaged her brain.
Instead, as a psychotherapist, he thought talking about the obsession might lead to a cure. It did not. (Neither did medication.) He could find nothing in her background, or her current life, that could explain why she thought her dentist was madly in love with her, and why she started to stalk him. (Do note the word “incurable” in the book’s title. It’s there for a good reason.) So what is the reader left with? The doctor simply saying Megan was incurable, and suggesting that her obsession was simply a magnification of the irrational thinking and actions associated with being “love-struck”. Hence, any one of us could end up like Megan if “love-struck”.
I’m afraid I found his conclusions a bit worrisome. (They are particularly worrisome if teenagers, or others prone to irrational fears, are reading this book.) As stated earlier, De Clerambault’s Syndrome is rare. If it could happen to any one of us, it would not be rare. While it’s possible Dr. Tallis’ compassion led him to make such a statement, I’m not certain of that; since the last paragraph about Megan had him saying he lost touch with her, but still thought about her; imagining her going home, taking an object out of her dentist shrine box, “closing her eyes and communing with a man who has probably forgotten that she exists by now.”
How dramatic. And how maddening. Although it’s refreshing to see the doctor is not an arrogant man who refuses to reveal his failures, he seemed to be too accepting of the fact that people like poor Megan are incurable; that there wasn’t anything missed about her life, or her brain activity, that could have been discovered, and could have unlocked the chain to her obsession. She just ends up a sad woman and a sad story in his book. (It’s interesting to note that besides writing about psychology, Dr. Tallis is also a successful novelist. Maybe he should save his sad images of the future of his patients for his novels.)
It’s not that I refuse to accept that some, if not many, mentally ill individuals end up “incurable”, or that absolutely no one is immune to mental illness, but that I feel Dr. Tallis too strongly suggests that someone can suddenly go off the deep end. Mental illness does not work like that, unless there is a brain problem involved. In addition, the doctor’s suggestion that we might have less free will than we think is once again him suggesting we have little or no control over our own mental health. When in reality, what usually determines mental health are all the decisions one makes every day of one’s life, starting at a very young age. Many of these decisions aren’t even remembered, but they were still made.
Love or hate? Be fearful or brave? Forgive or hold a grudge forever? Drink or do drugs or not? Tell the truth or lie? Take responsibility or blame someone else? Turn outward or remain self-absorbed? Empathy or self-pity? Bad past decisions, like bad past experiences, don’t always doom someone, either. Newer, better decisions can start being made any day of the week. Sometimes I think some psychotherapists actually like the idea that anyone could easily become mentally ill, or everyone is mentally ill to a point, because they need the work; or want to think their work is indispensable to mankind; or maybe because they are mentally ill themselves. Or maybe they just want to reduce the stigma of mental illness by suggesting anyone and everyone can easily go off the deep end, and they have no control over that happening or responsibility for it. That fortunately is not true.
(Note: I received a free ARC of this book from Amazon Vine.)
August 7, 2018
You can also find this review
on my book blog.
It’s no secret that I enjoy reading psychology non-fiction books and that I’m interested in Psychology. Tallis’ book intrigued me because of the subject matter it deals with – love, to be precise: obsessive love. I rarely read and find books on this subject so I was glad I stumbled upon it.
While reading this book I wrote notes on the first half of the book because many chapters were interesting and contained a lot of information I found useful. The Incurable Romantic contains twelve chapters and each of them deal with a different problem and aspect of love. The stories inside this book are based on real life cases the author worked on with the names of people changed in order to protect identities of his patients. I really don’t want to make this review long but I tend to write essays on non-fiction books so I’ll try and be efficient. In the preface of this book Tallis writes about earlier understandings of love and ‘lovesickness’. He uses a philosopher called Lucretius and looks at his definition on both terms. The conclusion he comes to is that both views on love and lovesickness haven’t changed much in nearly two-thousand years – which means that these feelings have been around for a while. The first chapter of this book The Barrister’s Clerk examines love that is very obsessive to the point where our subject can’t get the person she has feelings for out of her mind. We are talking about stalking here – where the person she likes doesn’t share the same feelings, the person is married but still our subject can’t get these facts into her mind. Tallis explains that the subject suffers from de Clerambault’s syndrome which is a form of a delusional disorder where the person believes that another person is infatuated with them. We see how this obsession ruins her life because she can’t accept that the other person doesn’t share the same feelings. In the second chapter called The Haunted Bedroom we meet our subject, an old woman who lost her husband and who feels very depressed and lonely. When Tallis interviews her what she says is very peculiar, he asks her ‘What do you miss most about your husband?’ and she replies ‘The sex.’. She begins to see her husband everywhere, in the house, in the park. Here Tallis explains something called PBHE or Post Bereavement Hallucinatory Experience. Furthermore, Tallis explains that people we loved [who passed away] have a subconscious place in our mind which can cause us to see or feel the persons presence because we were with them for a long period of time. Seeing the people we were close to makes us more comfortable and helps us grieve better. In the third chapter called The Woman Who Wasn’t There we see how the Delusional disorder: Jealous type takes effect on a woman who becomes obsessed with her boyfriend to a very extreme point. She becomes very jealous because her boyfriend doesn’t text her (even though he texts her every chance he gets), doesn’t tell her where he’s going etc. What we see is how a relationship can be ruined because of jealousy that consumes our subject. This chapter is very relatable to me because I find myself to be the same but not to that extreme. I found Anita’s concerns to be something I would be asking myself too but there were certain parts where her actions couldn’t be justified. There are many interesting stories in this book but sadly I can’t share them because this review would be long. Even though this book doesn’t offer solutions to problems each subject has it gives a fresh perspective on things like obsession, delusion, addiction, love.
I would complain about the lack of resolution to this problem because I really wanted to know more about each person I encountered in this book but psychoanalysis and therapy, as Tallis says, often fail when it comes to resolving certain problems but what they do is offer new insight into problem they try to cure.
It is safe to say that The Incurable Romantic is a book that offers an insight into obsessive love as well as historical background on psychological and biological factors that influence love and how people perceive and express it.
To anyone who enjoys reading books about psychology and is interested in human nature and how we perceive love should read The Incurable Romantic.
I would like to thank the publisher Little Brown UK for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions written here are my own and weren’t influenced by anything.
It’s no secret that I enjoy reading psychology non-fiction books and that I’m interested in Psychology. Tallis’ book intrigued me because of the subject matter it deals with – love, to be precise: obsessive love. I rarely read and find books on this subject so I was glad I stumbled upon it.
While reading this book I wrote notes on the first half of the book because many chapters were interesting and contained a lot of information I found useful. The Incurable Romantic contains twelve chapters and each of them deal with a different problem and aspect of love. The stories inside this book are based on real life cases the author worked on with the names of people changed in order to protect identities of his patients. I really don’t want to make this review long but I tend to write essays on non-fiction books so I’ll try and be efficient. In the preface of this book Tallis writes about earlier understandings of love and ‘lovesickness’. He uses a philosopher called Lucretius and looks at his definition on both terms. The conclusion he comes to is that both views on love and lovesickness haven’t changed much in nearly two-thousand years – which means that these feelings have been around for a while. The first chapter of this book The Barrister’s Clerk examines love that is very obsessive to the point where our subject can’t get the person she has feelings for out of her mind. We are talking about stalking here – where the person she likes doesn’t share the same feelings, the person is married but still our subject can’t get these facts into her mind. Tallis explains that the subject suffers from de Clerambault’s syndrome which is a form of a delusional disorder where the person believes that another person is infatuated with them. We see how this obsession ruins her life because she can’t accept that the other person doesn’t share the same feelings. In the second chapter called The Haunted Bedroom we meet our subject, an old woman who lost her husband and who feels very depressed and lonely. When Tallis interviews her what she says is very peculiar, he asks her ‘What do you miss most about your husband?’ and she replies ‘The sex.’. She begins to see her husband everywhere, in the house, in the park. Here Tallis explains something called PBHE or Post Bereavement Hallucinatory Experience. Furthermore, Tallis explains that people we loved [who passed away] have a subconscious place in our mind which can cause us to see or feel the persons presence because we were with them for a long period of time. Seeing the people we were close to makes us more comfortable and helps us grieve better. In the third chapter called The Woman Who Wasn’t There we see how the Delusional disorder: Jealous type takes effect on a woman who becomes obsessed with her boyfriend to a very extreme point. She becomes very jealous because her boyfriend doesn’t text her (even though he texts her every chance he gets), doesn’t tell her where he’s going etc. What we see is how a relationship can be ruined because of jealousy that consumes our subject. This chapter is very relatable to me because I find myself to be the same but not to that extreme. I found Anita’s concerns to be something I would be asking myself too but there were certain parts where her actions couldn’t be justified. There are many interesting stories in this book but sadly I can’t share them because this review would be long. Even though this book doesn’t offer solutions to problems each subject has it gives a fresh perspective on things like obsession, delusion, addiction, love.
I would complain about the lack of resolution to this problem because I really wanted to know more about each person I encountered in this book but psychoanalysis and therapy, as Tallis says, often fail when it comes to resolving certain problems but what they do is offer new insight into problem they try to cure.
It is safe to say that The Incurable Romantic is a book that offers an insight into obsessive love as well as historical background on psychological and biological factors that influence love and how people perceive and express it.
To anyone who enjoys reading books about psychology and is interested in human nature and how we perceive love should read The Incurable Romantic.
I would like to thank the publisher Little Brown UK for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions written here are my own and weren’t influenced by anything.
January 2, 2021
Psihologs stāsta par saviem klientiem, kas nākuši pie viņa patoloģisku ar mīlestību saistītu problēmu risināšanai. Piemēram, džeks, kurš uzskata, ka viņu apsēdis dēmons liek iet pie prostitūtām. Vai sieviete, kas kļuvusi apmāta ar savu zobārstu un par spīti visam ir pārliecināta, ka mīlestība ir abpusēja. Vai pedofils, kurš saprotamā kārtā dikti satraucas par savām tieksmēm. Tādā garā. Vispār jau forši stāstiņi Olivera Saksa stilā, tikai manai gaumei mazdruscītiņ par daudz filozofijas.
October 8, 2018
**3.5 stars rounded up.**
I really enjoyed this collection of case studies on the intricacies and impacts on love on a person's mental health (and vice versa). The author's writing style lends itself well to conveying the details to the reader; the language he uses is never over the top clinical, but it doesn't feel like he's dumbing things down for the reader either.
I've read other books by psychologists and doctors where the tone is so superior that it really took me out of the book, despite the content being interesting. This isn't the case at all here. The case studies and vignettes read like short stories rather than intense clinical analyses of the patients, making for a very enjoyable read.
I appreciated that the author provided just enough historical context to bring the reader deeper into each case, without bogging it down or making it feel dry. This is a great example of medical writing that doesn't FEEL clinical, and I have a feeling a good deal of that has to do with the author's experience as a novelist as well. I'll definitely be checking out some of his fiction, as I really enjoyed his writing style here.
I really enjoyed this collection of case studies on the intricacies and impacts on love on a person's mental health (and vice versa). The author's writing style lends itself well to conveying the details to the reader; the language he uses is never over the top clinical, but it doesn't feel like he's dumbing things down for the reader either.
I've read other books by psychologists and doctors where the tone is so superior that it really took me out of the book, despite the content being interesting. This isn't the case at all here. The case studies and vignettes read like short stories rather than intense clinical analyses of the patients, making for a very enjoyable read.
I appreciated that the author provided just enough historical context to bring the reader deeper into each case, without bogging it down or making it feel dry. This is a great example of medical writing that doesn't FEEL clinical, and I have a feeling a good deal of that has to do with the author's experience as a novelist as well. I'll definitely be checking out some of his fiction, as I really enjoyed his writing style here.
August 2, 2019
Tak toto ma bavilo veľmi! Bolo to ako nahliadnúť do vnútorného sveta iných ľudí a roznych úchyliek, depresií, sexuálnych deviancií...; skrátka čistý voyerizmus. My ľudia sme skutoční voyeuri.
Každá psychoterapia je ako spovedné tajomstvo. Lekár/terapeut nesmie o svojich pacientoch hovoriť a pritom: ach, ako by sme všetci chceli vedieť čo sa za dverami ambulancie deje! Žiarlivosť, posadnutie démonom, pedofília... všetko v jednej knihe - reálne prípady a teória. Excelentné.
Každá psychoterapia je ako spovedné tajomstvo. Lekár/terapeut nesmie o svojich pacientoch hovoriť a pritom: ach, ako by sme všetci chceli vedieť čo sa za dverami ambulancie deje! Žiarlivosť, posadnutie démonom, pedofília... všetko v jednej knihe - reálne prípady a teória. Excelentné.
October 31, 2018
I love psychology, so when I saw this book on Netgalley I knew it was a match made in heaven. I’ve never been a “romantic” myself, so I was curious what psychological issues would arise from the research into romance and love. Boy did this book deliver. The book details personal experiences of the author and psychologist, with patients he has had over the years with myriad different mental and psychology disorders related to romance, love and attraction.
We hear about a woman who wakes up from a normal dental procedure to find she is in love with her dentist, and she knows that he is in love with her too. Without any sort of inclination to indicate as such, and in fact multiple requests from the dentist for her to leave him and his family alone. A woman with no history of mental illness and who insists she is still very much in love with her husband. But is obsessed over the love that she believes is shared between her and her dentist and the dentist’s unwillingness to admit his feelings.
We also get stories involving a man obsessed with the feeling of someone falling in love with him; a woman who drives away every man she’s ever loved with pathological jealousy. And, much to the dismay of many who want to read this, we also get a glimpse into the psyche of a man who is notably a pedophile, who understands his desires are wrong and works to accept the fact that he will never be able to be in a loving mutual relationship.
Frank Tallis is everything you would want in a psychologist. He is sympathetic and non-judgmental, even when his base beliefs would promote otherwise. His candid but sensitive recounting of his patients and their problems was done with a scientific approach and he remained a clinical observer throughout. Neither promoting or condemning the actions of those who sought his help. I was thoroughly taken with this book and definitely see myself reading it again in the future.
Received via Netgalley. I have provided a truthful review of my own accord, and it reflects my opinion alone.
We hear about a woman who wakes up from a normal dental procedure to find she is in love with her dentist, and she knows that he is in love with her too. Without any sort of inclination to indicate as such, and in fact multiple requests from the dentist for her to leave him and his family alone. A woman with no history of mental illness and who insists she is still very much in love with her husband. But is obsessed over the love that she believes is shared between her and her dentist and the dentist’s unwillingness to admit his feelings.
We also get stories involving a man obsessed with the feeling of someone falling in love with him; a woman who drives away every man she’s ever loved with pathological jealousy. And, much to the dismay of many who want to read this, we also get a glimpse into the psyche of a man who is notably a pedophile, who understands his desires are wrong and works to accept the fact that he will never be able to be in a loving mutual relationship.
Frank Tallis is everything you would want in a psychologist. He is sympathetic and non-judgmental, even when his base beliefs would promote otherwise. His candid but sensitive recounting of his patients and their problems was done with a scientific approach and he remained a clinical observer throughout. Neither promoting or condemning the actions of those who sought his help. I was thoroughly taken with this book and definitely see myself reading it again in the future.
Received via Netgalley. I have provided a truthful review of my own accord, and it reflects my opinion alone.
August 4, 2018
Disclaimer: A copy was provided by NetGalley for an honest review
I am a little upset that I didn't like this book. Technically, it has everything I usually like: talks about real people, has some history of mental health, has other interesting things thrown here and there. All of that should have solidify a good rating from me. But it didn't...I didn't like the writing and couldn't connect with it at all. Half the time I felt like the author was making fun of people he was supposed to be helping and other times it felt like I was being lectured at. Reading session notes, as entertaining as some of them were, made me feel like I was reading someone's diary and I felt a little dirty for violating their privacy.
I am a little upset that I didn't like this book. Technically, it has everything I usually like: talks about real people, has some history of mental health, has other interesting things thrown here and there. All of that should have solidify a good rating from me. But it didn't...I didn't like the writing and couldn't connect with it at all. Half the time I felt like the author was making fun of people he was supposed to be helping and other times it felt like I was being lectured at. Reading session notes, as entertaining as some of them were, made me feel like I was reading someone's diary and I felt a little dirty for violating their privacy.
August 7, 2022
Very interesting and at times very chilling. The author worked as a psychotherapist and in this book he describes some of his most interesting patients. He shows their mental health problems in the wider context of psychotherapy, history and diversity of human behaviour. The book was easy to read and written with compassion. Insightful.
April 11, 2020
Láska v rôznych podobách, obavy, úzkosti, traumy, nádeje a túžby. Podané z pohľadu psychoterapeuta a predsa ľudsky. Poučné čítanie.
“Láska nás rozhodí a odhalí, akí sme krehkí.”
“Láska nás rozhodí a odhalí, akí sme krehkí.”
July 25, 2020
“All mature adults must accept that they are essentially unknowable—and that they will never know the one they love...The real metric by which we can gauge the authenticity of love is not how close we want to be, how merged and intermingled, but how far we can stand apart and still be together”
Full of consolations, reflections, and thought-provoking statements like this; Dr Tallis explores the intersect between love and mental illness. The truth is, a great number of internationally-recognised mental health disorders are underpinned by love and love-related experiences. Dr Tallis demonstrates this association by exploring the cases of ten individuals. Each case study, exploring a different individual succumbing to a different form of mental illness as a consequence of the 'love' they experience and indulge in, both educates the reader in different theories of psychology and acts as a lesson in self-reflection and awareness. Some of the symptoms, conditions, and themes in this book are those that I'm willing to bet even you have experienced at some point. Interesting, isn't it?
Full of consolations, reflections, and thought-provoking statements like this; Dr Tallis explores the intersect between love and mental illness. The truth is, a great number of internationally-recognised mental health disorders are underpinned by love and love-related experiences. Dr Tallis demonstrates this association by exploring the cases of ten individuals. Each case study, exploring a different individual succumbing to a different form of mental illness as a consequence of the 'love' they experience and indulge in, both educates the reader in different theories of psychology and acts as a lesson in self-reflection and awareness. Some of the symptoms, conditions, and themes in this book are those that I'm willing to bet even you have experienced at some point. Interesting, isn't it?
August 4, 2021
Это был match с первых десяти страниц. Всего в книге двенадцать глав, в каждой из которой автор рассказывает о случаях из своей психотерапевтической практики, которые тем или иным образом связаны с любовной и сексуальной сферой. Главная тема - love taken to extremes, любовь до нездоровой крайности. Про патологическую ревность, сексуальную зависимость, одержимость, религиозный фанатизм, синдром Клерамбо, нарциссизм, невозможность пережить расставание и преследование бывшего партнёра ; о том, как психотерапевт себя может чувствовать, когда ему рассказывают максимально откровенные детали своей интимной жизни. Много отсылок к истории психологии, много известных имён клиницистов, терапевтов, древнегреческих поэтов. Приятно подмечать насколько автор эрудированный. Также здесь есть немного поверхностной информации о том или ином подходе: в основном когнитивной-поведенческий и психоаналитический. Лёгкая, но в то же время со смысловой нагрузкой. Хочется поразмышлять после каждой главы и растянуть хотя бы на 12 дней. У меня почти получилось :)
August 5, 2022
Táto kniha ma veľmi prekvapila a nečakala som, že sa mi bude páčiť až tak veľmi. Teda nie, že páčila, ale som maximálne nadšená. Bavil ma autorov štýl, vďaka ktorému som mala pocit, že čítam beletriu, ale popri tom jednotlivé problémy svojich klientov vysvetľoval z psychologického hľadiska. Stránky ubiehali rýchlo a po prečítaní poslednej kapitoly mi bolo ľúto, že už som na konci. Som si istá, že knihu si prečítam znova a verím, že v nej znova objavím niečo nové.
October 20, 2018
I went into this expecting a few amusing stories, but was very pleased to discover instead fairly in-depth explorations of 12 different psychological cases, some unusual and some a bit more common. From a woman convinced that her dentist is deeply in love with her to a man who has visited thousands of prostitutes over the course of a few months, every case presents something utterly foreign and fascinating - and Frank Tallis manages to present each story with understanding, empathy, and reflection. Really fascinating and well written book.
November 8, 2018
This non-fiction has the right balance of psychological / psychiatric theories, actual case studies, the perceptions of the treating doctor, and a well-written story-book style prose. It will put you in a reflective mood, against your better judgement!
Thanks to the publisher for the ARC. Loved it. And all the best to the doctor peering out the window at a stale surrounding.
Thanks to the publisher for the ARC. Loved it. And all the best to the doctor peering out the window at a stale surrounding.
September 21, 2019
Beletrizované klinické prípady z psychologickej praxe, týkajúce sa jednej témy: lásky. Fakt som netušila, čo od toho čakať, ale napokon ma veľmi bavilo čítať o láske z tohto pohľadu. Jednoznačne kniha pre všetkých milovníkov psychológie!
March 3, 2021
I picked this up at random at a book sale, it was a really good read though. While it focuses on the more extreme cases of love gone wrong, it gets to theme that love drives us all a bit mad, makes us vulnerable, and should be taken more seriously from a medical perspective. Perhaps the last intention could’ve been stated more clearly at the start, it I thought the central theme was evident enough for the final chapter to function as a satisfactory conclusion and presentation of this intent.
In this book you will encounter different forms of pathology, e.g. obsessive love of various kinds, one that seems very unusual and another that seems very ordinary, but also love that turns into psychosis, infatuation chasers, demon possession, dangerous jealousy, and paedophilia. The latter is uncomfortable, to the author as well, but still very interesting.
The author does like to go off on tangents from the case introduced, but always does so to medically or historically contextualize what he is talking about. This makes the book accessible to the general public, and those who desire a “drier” form of narrative should probably look to get a book from a university press rather than a general publisher. This is categorized as “memoir/psychology” so it is clearly meant as a more accessible text, not a formal presentation of clinical studies.
I liked a lot of the little details in this book, but this quote in particular, and generally the whole discussion on hallucinations, stuck with me:
“The cognitive psychologist Roger Shephard has said that perception is ‘externally guided hallucination’ and hallucination is ‘internally guided hallucination’. In other words, reality isn’t entirely authentic and hallucinations aren’t complete fabrications.”
In this book you will encounter different forms of pathology, e.g. obsessive love of various kinds, one that seems very unusual and another that seems very ordinary, but also love that turns into psychosis, infatuation chasers, demon possession, dangerous jealousy, and paedophilia. The latter is uncomfortable, to the author as well, but still very interesting.
The author does like to go off on tangents from the case introduced, but always does so to medically or historically contextualize what he is talking about. This makes the book accessible to the general public, and those who desire a “drier” form of narrative should probably look to get a book from a university press rather than a general publisher. This is categorized as “memoir/psychology” so it is clearly meant as a more accessible text, not a formal presentation of clinical studies.
I liked a lot of the little details in this book, but this quote in particular, and generally the whole discussion on hallucinations, stuck with me:
“The cognitive psychologist Roger Shephard has said that perception is ‘externally guided hallucination’ and hallucination is ‘internally guided hallucination’. In other words, reality isn’t entirely authentic and hallucinations aren’t complete fabrications.”
January 20, 2020
Some very interesting aspects of love were discussed here, from the point of view of a psychiatrist experienced in dealing with patients struggling with the nature of the beast. A number of chapters were very interesting indeed - particularly the earlier chapters about De Clérambault's syndrome, bereavement, and paranoid distrust of ones partner - but some of the cases in the second half of the book seemed less compelling reading. I found too that at times the author's anecdotal style moved from the positive of 'approachable and relatable' to the negative of 'mundane and irrelevant' as Tallis talked more about his daily life as a psychiatrist. I was hence simultaneously left wanting more scientific content and wanting a little less human interest filler. It was, however, a stimulating start for those interested in the field and at times very thought-provoking.
December 20, 2025
I’ve recommended this book numerous times and where I did not recommend it, I retold some of the cases.
Tallis’s book is a gem of popular psychology and it is extremely important in our times of mental disorders on the rise, it’s important to be aware of and understand the mental consequences of alleged romantic affairs.
Tallis’s book is a gem of popular psychology and it is extremely important in our times of mental disorders on the rise, it’s important to be aware of and understand the mental consequences of alleged romantic affairs.
July 15, 2020
Superficial.
May 9, 2024
2.5/5
August 30, 2020
Casos médicos cortos,... sobre el amor. Recuerda a Oliver Sacks, aunque más ameno. Muy recomendable, un gustazo.
July 4, 2018
In ' The Incurable Romantic' , Frank Tallis presents us with a thought provoking portrait of love, it's idiosyncrasies, contradictions and perversities.The book is segmented into chapters, each delving into an aspect of love. Tallis, a clinical psychologist and psychotherapist, primarily uses his own clinical case studies to seduce us to follow him down a meandering path of psychological research, philosophy, art and literature, all in the name of this strange thing called love. And follow I did. Reading Tallis' skillful prose there were times when his writing was so poignant and beautiful it was like a punch to the guts. In one chapter he describes how a woman with De Clerambault's syndrome , suffering under an intense delusion of reciprocated love builds a shrine to her beloved dentist who petrified of this woman, moved to Dubai. When Tallis asks her poor husband if he has ever thought of destroying that shrine, the husband is shocked, he would never do that because the thought of hurting her is abhorrent to him "I was touched by his compassion. Ordinary, non-pathological love can also be very extraordinary"'
As a psychologist myself, it was refreshing to find Tallis' cases progressed as many do, with surprising tangents and detours, premature endings and unresolved issues. Tallis' authenticity and honesty in this regard helps the reader trust him in his wanderings, although I have to say some of his tales did leave the reader feeling somewhat unsatisfied, a bit like when you eat a slice of day old carrot cake and then wonder if it was worth the calories. For example, Tallis presents a fascinating case of a man who falls in love with himself, forfeiting a relationship for his narcissism. Yet he never seems to explore this formulation with the client, or how he might have helped the client grow, and as a reader I felt very much a voyeur in this story. But as Tallis says himself when he receives a letter from an old client, we can not help but hope for romantic conclusions in stories, despite the fact they very rarely happen in reality. As with love, it's very much the journey that is important and not the destination. I would definitely recommend delving into this journey of the heart, mind and humanity itself, it is well worth the read.
As a psychologist myself, it was refreshing to find Tallis' cases progressed as many do, with surprising tangents and detours, premature endings and unresolved issues. Tallis' authenticity and honesty in this regard helps the reader trust him in his wanderings, although I have to say some of his tales did leave the reader feeling somewhat unsatisfied, a bit like when you eat a slice of day old carrot cake and then wonder if it was worth the calories. For example, Tallis presents a fascinating case of a man who falls in love with himself, forfeiting a relationship for his narcissism. Yet he never seems to explore this formulation with the client, or how he might have helped the client grow, and as a reader I felt very much a voyeur in this story. But as Tallis says himself when he receives a letter from an old client, we can not help but hope for romantic conclusions in stories, despite the fact they very rarely happen in reality. As with love, it's very much the journey that is important and not the destination. I would definitely recommend delving into this journey of the heart, mind and humanity itself, it is well worth the read.
December 27, 2018
Apie ją kuriamos dainos, rašomos knygos, statomi filmai, rodos, mokslininkai baigia plaukus nusirauti atlikdami įvairiausius tyrimus, tačiau meilės sritis vis dar daugumai žmonijos yra sunkiai paaiškinamas jausmas. Ir kartais atrodo, kad gal geriau net nebandyti to suprasti, o tiesiog pajausti ir su tuo jausmu gyventi, tačiau kartais tai gali būti pražūtinga. Psichoterapeutas Frank Tallis naujoje knygoje „Nepataisomas romantikas“ pabrėžia – įsimylėjimas yra greitai įsiliepsnojanti būsena, kurios simptomai yra panašūs į psichinės ligos simptomus. Tad gal vertėtų apie šią malonią „ligą“ sužinoti daugiau?
Knyga yra nepaprastai įdomių, kartais net neįtikimų istorijų saugykla – visas jas iš savo ilgos darbo patirties iškrapštė anglų psichoterapeutas Frank Tallis. Knyga sudaryta iš 12 skyrelių, kurie pasakoja apie tam tikros beprotiškos meilės atšaką. Tikėjausi, kad knygoje bus teoriškai analizuojamos įprastos meilės situacijos, tačiau autorius skaitytoją edukuoja kur kas labiau – dalinasi savo pacientų istorijomis, kurie buvo susidūrę su paranojiška, haliucinacine, idealizuojama, priklausomybę keliančia, kūniška, savanaudiška, homoseksualia ir net pedofiliška meile. Daugelis šių situacijų pirminiu skaitymu sukelia skaitytojui teigiamus arba neigiamus jausmus, tačiau psichoterapeutas moko skaitytoją išlikti objektyviam ir visas šias istorijas vertina per teorinę psichologijos literatūros, praktinę kitų gydytojų patirčių prizmę.
Skaitant kyla abejonės, kad ne viskas, ką matome nupiešta rožine spalva kitų žmonių santykiuose, yra taip gražu ir nuoširdu, kaip gali atrodyti, tad nereikia viskuo tikėti ir save lyginti su kitais žmonėmis. Geriau kur kas daugiau laiko skirti savo meilės santykiams analizuoti ir plėtoti – tikiu, kad ši knyga daugeliui iš mūsų gali padėti rasti teisingus atsakymus į klausimus, kodėl mes taip stipriai pavydime ir iš kur visas tas troškimas keršyti, kai būname įskaudinti. Ir, žinoma, gauti dar daugiau reikšmingos informacijos!
Knyga yra nepaprastai įdomių, kartais net neįtikimų istorijų saugykla – visas jas iš savo ilgos darbo patirties iškrapštė anglų psichoterapeutas Frank Tallis. Knyga sudaryta iš 12 skyrelių, kurie pasakoja apie tam tikros beprotiškos meilės atšaką. Tikėjausi, kad knygoje bus teoriškai analizuojamos įprastos meilės situacijos, tačiau autorius skaitytoją edukuoja kur kas labiau – dalinasi savo pacientų istorijomis, kurie buvo susidūrę su paranojiška, haliucinacine, idealizuojama, priklausomybę keliančia, kūniška, savanaudiška, homoseksualia ir net pedofiliška meile. Daugelis šių situacijų pirminiu skaitymu sukelia skaitytojui teigiamus arba neigiamus jausmus, tačiau psichoterapeutas moko skaitytoją išlikti objektyviam ir visas šias istorijas vertina per teorinę psichologijos literatūros, praktinę kitų gydytojų patirčių prizmę.
Skaitant kyla abejonės, kad ne viskas, ką matome nupiešta rožine spalva kitų žmonių santykiuose, yra taip gražu ir nuoširdu, kaip gali atrodyti, tad nereikia viskuo tikėti ir save lyginti su kitais žmonėmis. Geriau kur kas daugiau laiko skirti savo meilės santykiams analizuoti ir plėtoti – tikiu, kad ši knyga daugeliui iš mūsų gali padėti rasti teisingus atsakymus į klausimus, kodėl mes taip stipriai pavydime ir iš kur visas tas troškimas keršyti, kai būname įskaudinti. Ir, žinoma, gauti dar daugiau reikšmingos informacijos!
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