The Believer: Alien Encounters, Hard Science, and the Passion of John Mack

by Ralph Blumenthal, Phil Thron (Narrator)

The Believer is the weird and chilling true story of Dr. John Mack. This eminent Harvard psychiatrist and Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer risked his career to investigate the phenomenon of human encounters with aliens and to give credibility to the stupefying tales shared by people who were utterly convinced they had happened.

Nothing in Mack's four decades of psychiatry had prepared him for the otherworldly accounts of a cross section of humanity, including young children who reported being taken against their wills by alien beings. Over the course of his career, his interest in alien abduction grew from curiosity to wonder, ultimately developing into a limitless, unwavering passion.

Based on exclusive access to Mack's archives, journals, and psychiatric notes and interviews with his family and closest associates, The Believer reveals the life and work of a man who explored the deepest of scientific conundrums and further leads us to the hidden dimensions and alternate realities that captivated Mack until the end of his life.
©2021 Ralph Blumenthal (P)2021 Tantor


The Believer
Alien Encounters, Hard Science, and the Passion of John Mack
By: Ralph Blumenthal
Narrated by: Phil Thron
Length: 12 hrs and 20 mins
Unabridged Audiobook
Categories: Biographies & Memoirs, Professionals & Academics

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Aliens, Audiobook, Paranormal, Psychology, Science

Audible Audio

Published January 1, 2021

Reviews

[Tom · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Believer is a warts-and-all biography of alien abduction advocate John Mack that follows his journey from Pulitzer Prize-winning author (of A Prince of Our Disorder: The Life of T.E. Lawrence ) to credulous documenter of so-called "experiencers" -- men, women and children who claim to have been abducted or contacted by alien beings. Mack's bonafides as a Harvard Professor and acclaimed biographer are frequently cited by Ufologists as evidence of his unimpeachable character, but The Believer, despite not being a denunciation of Mack, uncovers a more complex story. Among other things, Mack was a follower of astrology, a believer in life after death (and the ability of the dead to communicate with the living), an enthusiastic user of mind-altering substances, and a horrible husband. These aspects of his character are usually left out by peers and supporters besotted by the credentials Mack brought to the subject, but Ralph Blumenthal has the integrity to include them.

I came out of this book not liking its subject very much. Mack's seeming willingness to believe almost any ridiculous story that he encountered is one thing, but his pattern of consistent selfishness and flirtations with misogyny ought to leave a sour note with anyone. Not that he's an entirely unsympathetic character: the efforts of Harvard to censure Mack for his unconventional views inspired outrage even among Mack's detractors, and The Believer documents this witch hunt insightfully. What little I knew about this period of Mack's life has come from UFO documentaries that have briefly referenced it. The involvement of men like Neil Sheehan and Alan Dershowitz was news to me, and it was fascinating to see how they -- Sheehan in particular -- played a part in Mack's defence.

Fans of the alien abduction sub-genre will enjoy The Believer's recounting of famous cases such as the Betty and Barney Hill abduction; the various claims that Mack's sometime friend, sometime antagonist Budd Hopkins promoted with his books; a sighting at a school in Zimbabwe that Mack briefly thought could be his next big case study; and the phenomenon's proliferation in pop culture during the 1990s and early 2000s. Using these reference points, Blumenthal does a good job of placing Mack and his work within the vast field of ufology. Like John G. Fuller's The Interrupted Journey and Ross Coulthart's In Plain Sight: An Investigation Into UFOs and Impossible Science , The Believer is arguably a better book than its subject deserves.

[JLTobias · Rating 5 out of 5]

Elegant Biography of John E. Mack

This elegant biography of John E. Mack portrays him as a lifelong spiritual seeker. Perhaps reacting to the void produced by his mother’s unexpected death during his first year of life, Mack was constantly seeking the missing piece of his heart and mind.

Mack’s journey led him to a career as a Harvard-trained psychiatrist, the founder of the day treatment program at Cambridge Memorial Hospital and the Pulitzer Prize winning biographer of the life and mind of Lawrence of Arabia. Later, his search for meaning led him to treat those reporting alien abductions and to study crop circles, near death experiences and life after death.

Mack is portrayed with respect and sensitivity. His openness to anomalous experiences and the spiritual realm is endearing and inspiring. This is a man who lived exuberantly and who cared deeply about the essential questions of life, death and meaning.

[Kobi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Never got around to reviewing this one when I read it last year but there's a lot to say. This is the story/biography of John Mack, who was a charismatic and well regarded psychiatrist who provided services for a lot of people with UFO experiences. John Mack was a Cool Freak, but there are definitely more and less charitable ways of viewing his life's work.

The uncharitable view: He was a charismatic doctor who, after resting on the laurels of his early career success and his old money New England wealth, surrounded himself with sexy muses and various sycophants, exploiting vulnerable populations to sensationalist, pseudoscientific ends.

The charitable view: He was a charismatic doctor who, after a lifetime of dissatisfaction with the limits, biases, and stigmatizing nature of Western medicine, worked with likeminded people to honestly engage with people who the rest of the medical (and lay) world dismissed on their face as "crazy." Even if he didn't know WHAT had happened to these people, approaching them with curiosity as opposed to judgement offered them hope and a way through their trauma that others refused to provide.

The truth (is out there) and probably lies somewhere in the middle. John Mack had an air of exuberant naivety around him, but I tend to take more of a charitable view of his work, even though I acknowledge that he got played plenty of times. Most importantly, I am less interested in the "truth" of what the people he worked with experienced, but am incredibly curious about his process, and the questions his work posed to the medical community and wider world. Why is our impulse to dismiss people with fantastical ideas and experiences so strong? What about their subjective reality is so threatening to ours? What does it mean to "believe" someone? What can this work teach us about trauma-informed care?

I felt like this book did a good enough job of ask/answering these questions, even if it was a little disorganized (which makes sense, given Mack's many political, literary, and scientific flights of fancy). All in all, this book hit the sweet spot of journalistic integrity, honest skepticism, and empathy for the stories it told, which is hard to find in ufology books. For that reason alone, I'd recommend this one widely.

[Khalid Abdul-Mumin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Might come back to this later in e-format, the audio I found a bit dull so I'm moving it from currently to dnf.

[Skrot · Rating 2 out of 5]

A missed opportunity. John Mack was a fascinating guy, a pioneer, but this book is a mess. It jumps all over the place, muddling the chronology. It also manages to make the topic of alien abduction boring, which is quite a feat! The real dealbreaker for me, though, is the fact that the author introduces every woman by describing her physical attributes and every man by describing his intellectual attributes. I gave up about halfway through the book, after the millionth time the author introduced a woman by commenting on her physical appearance. I now know what every woman in the book looks like, but the dudes are apparently just big brains floating in midair.

[ForenSeek · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delicious, full intellectual meal. Traces Dr. Mack's fascinating journey through life, with pit stops at Lawrence of Arabia, the psychology of nightmares, and alien abductions. The prose is enjoyable, which is imperative considering how much information is packed between the pages of this book. I'm still kind of absorbing all that I have read, but can easily already recommend this book to all those who are unafraid to tread intellectual ground that many avoid entering. As Mack's favorite quote states: "You make the path by walking." He lived as a testament to the truth of this saying. 

[Ellen · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s Complicated

John Mack was a complex, complicated, intelligent, inquisitive, creative human being. He never shied away from difficult subjects or situations. A lot of courage in the face of ridicule by peers. I couldn’t put the book down. So interesting! So glad I read this, but those cases of abduction scare the bejeezus out of me.

[no.stache.nietzsche · Rating 4 out of 5]

After reading various books on the more "pro" side of "disclosure", i.e. literature who take the reality of such encounters to evident a priori- people like Jorjani, Strieber, and Vallee, we decided to read a more "mainstream" book on the topic, and came across this biography of John Mack by a New York Times guy.

Overall, an interesting book, very focused on Mack's life in general. The alien encounter stuff was thus a running theme for most of the book, but not entirely. Interestingly, Mack got into post-mortem experience and NDEs towards the end of his life's research- an area that Jorjani also ties closely to the UFO/UAP phenomenon.

Nothing too ground shaking here, but overall an interesting perspective to balance out the "woo" territory we've been immersed in lately. Seems even handed and open minded, while remaining critical, as any good biography should be.

[Maree · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm still thinking about this one. It didn't spend as much time as I would have liked on some of Dr. Mack's more controversial cases - I found the Ariel School section especially brief and lacking in detail. Much of the book seemed to be about name-dropping Mack's wealthy and influential connections rather than the substance of his research.

I do genuinely appreciate the kind of insight into his inner life that is only possible because of the Mack family's generous cooperation and sharing of his letters, journals, and transcripts. Blumenthal works really hard to provide needed context to the unusual arc of Mack's career while remaining objective about the Big Mystery at it's core. What actually happened to the experiencers that Mack treated? How much did Mack truly believe, and how much did he merely want to believe?

Personally, I enjoy creeping myself out speculating about alien encounters, but I'm skeptical about accounts that depict aliens who are hyperfocused on human reproduction - as one of the experts Blumenthal interviews points out, our biology is not all that complex. If you figured out interstellar travel, surely you can wrap your mind around gametes and cell division without needing to traumatize hundreds (thousands?) of people over the course of multiple decades. Hell, we already did a lot of the work for you, just hack into Elsevier and PubMed and pirate a copy of Adobe Reader you guys.

[Chris · Rating 1 out of 5]

I couldn't get past the six chapter. I got tired of reading about everyone's title and how great of a college they went to. I got the impression they were saying "look how great we are" instead of focusing on alien encounters.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

As one reviewer pointed out (on amazon.com I think), it's difficult to know how to review this book. Should I rate Blumenthal's biography? John Mack's research? Or the likelihood that alien abduction experiences are based on genuine, real-world events? Here are my thoughts on each, in order:

Ralph Blumenthal's biography: Overall, the biography is very well researched and presented. It's based on extensive recordings and Mack's archive which is not available to the public. Blumenthal surveys Mack's entire life though he devotes most of the space to Mack's research on alien abduction experiences from 1989 onwards. There's a chapter on Mack's book on Lawrence of Arabia, there's a bit about Mack's book on Vivienne, a fourteen-year-old poet and suicide victim (a book I actually want to read), and there's some speculation as to how the early death of Mack's biological mother might have affected the young boy. On the whole, the biography is fairly well written and comprehensive when it comes to Mack's research in the early 90s. However, as some other reviewers have noted, sometimes the names and references are a bit distracting. Blumenthal, when introducing even minor figures or locations, tends to get carried away mentioning all the famous connections and relations such figures and locations have. I think a lot of these references could have been relocated to the endnotes since they only highlighted, for me at least, how elite and well-connected Mack's family was.

John Mack's Research: I didn't know really anything about John Mack before reading this book. I read it because it was written by a reputable writer and published by a reputable press. Most of the literature on abduction narratives, it seems, is published by fringe presses and I'm not sure I want to read non-fiction works that haven't been carefully fact-checked and edited (this comes from someone who self-published his own novel with a very clearly low-budget front cover). I wasn't familiar with Mack's study of Lawrance of Arabia or with his status as a Harvard psychiatrist. However, based on Blumenthal's biography, I've reached a few conclusions about Mack's approach: (1) Mack seemed disposed to pursue whatever attracted his attention. His whole Lawrance of Arabia phase seemed to just emerge out of nowhere after watching a film. He seemed to take a similar approach to alien abduction experiences. He heard about them, became fascinated by them, and then dove into the work headfirst. (2) Mack lacked a certain critical or skeptical distance from his subjects. When I read about Donna Bassett's 'abduction experiences,' they appeared to me completely fabricated - meeting with Kennedy and Khrushchev on a spaceship during the Cuban missile crisis?! (236). How could Mack not have seen through her? And Bassett herself, far from being mentally stable, failed to come across as the kind of well-adjusted experiencer Mack claimed he was studying. Maybe she was more convincing in person, but the fact that Mack fell for her scam was evidence, I think, that he was not very careful with his research. Similarly, in addition to exploring abduction experiences, Mack would consult astrologists and attend questionable paranormal meetings (216). I started wondering if there was anything too strange for Mack not to believe. When reading the Wikipedia entry on Mack before reading this book, I thought it was outrageous that Harvard would launch an investigation into his research. But while reading the book, I started to see their logic. Mack couldn't explain his method. He would hypnotize his patients but the reliability of insights acquired through hypnosis has been strongly questioned (side note, a psychoanalyst who attended my church when I was living in Milwaukee once asked me on a Sunday morning what I thought about hypnosis. Taken aback I said I really didn't know. He said someone he once hypnotized remembered their Latin grammar under hypnosis . . . .). Mack would perform the hypnoses in his son's former bedroom in what seemed to me a very uncontrolled setting. (3) Mack, when pressed by the Harvard review committee, questioned whether abduction phenomena could be studied 'scientifically.' By the end of the process, he came around to the idea of at least testing the psychological traits of alleged abductees. My issue here is that once we reject any kind of systematic approach to studying something, we might just end up with a collection of anecdotes, some potentially reliable, others not. Even if the approach is not scientific in some traditional sense of the word, having at least a primitive method is important.

The likelihood of alien abduction experiences being based on genuine, real-world events: I find the materialist paradigm completely unconvincing. There is an overwhelming amount of evidence that the physico-material world we live in is not all there is. That being said, I don't think this rejection of materialism requires belief in the real-world basis for abduction narratives. At this stage, I think they are interesting but more research is needed and I would heartily endorse grants for studies of these phenomena that are not a priori committed to certain conclusions (i.e. that they are just psychological phenomena). One huge problem with a lot of the scientific work on consciousness out there is that the researchers have already decided in advance what kinds of conclusions they are looking for. The problem is that if we are attentive to the phenomena themselves and allow ourselves to be drawn to unanticipated conclusions, we might end up with results we weren't suspecting. The same applies to alien abduction narratives. Perhaps they're based on genuine real-world experiences, maybe they're purely psychological phenomena. But we'll never know if we don't study them. And we certainly will not find out if we decide in advance they are just figments of imaginations. But while Mack did advance the study of abduction experiences considerably, his gullibility ended up damaging the reputability of his research. Skeptics can now point to Donna Bassett, or to his late-life fascination with magical stones and say that Mack is unreliable, even if doing so would be like dismissing Newton's scientific contributions on the grounds that he was interested in alchemy.

End note: I found Mack's final message in the Epilogue unsettling. What do you think he was trying to communicate, if anything? He seems to be saying that the mediums, psychics, and others he fraternized with were not correct about the afterlife. This raises the following question: if certain people are able to communicate with the spiritual realm, how do we know they are not being tricked? What if these apparent spirits/aliens are actually malicious and want to deceive us?

[Zachary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I got this as a random pick from the library, intrigued by the story of a Harvard professor who took alien abductions seriously. What I got was a really fascinating, sympathetic portrait not just of that professor, John Mack, but of a number of people who followed him on a journey of doubt, discovery, and frank openness over the decades. I'm not quite sure what I expected to learn from this book, but at the end of it I feel like what I came away with was an appreciation for people who are willing to listen to others compassionately, who are willing to admit when they are wrong (whether about the way the world works or their own flawed research methods), and an admiration for people who are willing to risk their reputations in the name of something they believe. The book itself was a mix of relatively straightforward biography with some analysis of the larger cultural reckoning with the phenomenon of alien abductions and UFOs. This meant that some sections of the book felt a bit different than others, with a kind of unevenness at times that I didn't love, even if the whole thing felt relatively cohesive by the end. Though I didn't necessarily come away with any newfound discoveries about aliens/alien life/people, per se, I enjoyed my time with this book and the sympathy and compassion at its core.

[Nate Rabe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating. Fascinating

[Natalie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Recently, my husband and I discovered a captivating television show on National Geographic called UFOs: Investigating the Unknown. This program presented fascinating information about UFOs through interviews with journalists, scientists, and individuals with personal experiences. I learned about the government’s secrecy surrounding Project Blue Book and even witnessed congressional sessions where well-respected military personnel shared their insights. What impressed me most was the neutrality of the experts. They were committed to their research, not seeking a specific outcome or proving or disproving the existence of aliens. Instead, they aimed to gain a deeper understanding of this intriguing phenomenon.

While watching the show, I was introduced to several experts who have written intriguing books that I’ve added to my wishlist. One of them is Ralph Blumenthal, a renowned reporter who wrote a biography titled The Believer: Alien Encounters, Hard Science, and the Passion of John Mack. John Mack, a Harvard psychiatrist, stumbled upon an opportunity to meet with individuals who claimed to have been abducted by aliens. This wasn’t a subject that naturally piqued his interest, nor did he seek to become overly involved in it.

The Believer delves into Mack’s upbringing and his decision to pursue a career in psychiatry. As he delved deeper into the field, he became increasingly intrigued by the individuals who reported these extraordinary experiences. He began treating these individuals with hypnosis and group therapy, and while he didn’t necessarily hold personal beliefs about aliens, he deeply believed in the experiences of his clients. Mack ruled out mental illness and took their accounts at face value. He treated these individuals with respect and compassion, addressing their emotional needs with utmost care.

This biography offers a detailed account of John Mack’s personal and professional life. I found it intriguing that the book mentions Timothy Leary and Ram Dass (also known as Richard Alpert), his fascination with LSD, and his involvement in meditation. Mack was open to exploring various methods for promoting mental well-being, as he had his own personal traumas to process. He even participated in an Ayahuasca ceremony. Throughout his journey, Mack traveled the world, meeting captivating individuals like the Dalai Lama and interviewing those who claimed to have encountered unidentified flying objects. Despite the controversy surrounding his work, Mack was widely regarded as a respected psychiatrist.

I purchased the audiobook of The Believer through my Audible membership. The narration by Phil Thron effectively brought John Mack’s story to life.

I have photos, videos, and additional information that I'm unable to include here. It can all be found on my blog, in the link below.
A Book And A Dog

[Chad Schultz · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was recommended to me by someone in a skeptic group, after I said I wanted to figure out why credulous people were so drawn to believing in UFO abductions, even when their "memories" were painful.
Listening to this book, I wasn't sure what to make of it. The author mentions completely groundless things in passing (like Silva mind control, ESP, receiving messages from the dead) as if they were obviously, 100% literally true and needed no further comment. On the other hand, he occasionally lightly touches on a fact here or there that goes completely counter to a belief in UFOs. I couldn't figure out if he was trying to write a book to convince skeptics to believe in UFOs (not likely; skeptics would either be completely turned off by the things I already mentioned, or would fact-check he anecdotes he references and then be turned off), or if the book was written to convince UFO believers to pay attention to contradictory evidence (not likely; they'd completely miss the few counterpoints he does present).
The end of the book made it more obvious; the author laments that so much money was put into the Large Hadron Collider, but so little money has been put into trying to find evidence to support people's UFO abduction stories.
As for the book overall, it's a biography of a man who believed absolutely in UFOs. He interviewed many "experiencers" and took everything they said at face value as literal, infallible truth - even if they were three years old.
I don't see the value in books like this that promote misinformation.

[Sonic · Rating 5 out of 5]

Though I was twice unable to finish John E. Mack’s “Abductions” it was an incredible paradigm shifting book that lead me to what I call the “what if? mindset.” I began to consider “what if this could be true?” as a new approach to almost any facts or stories that I came across. Even people who tell themselves that they are open-minded will also say “I don’t believe in ghosts” or “I don’t believe in U.F.O.s” immediately when confronted with someone’s story. This is not true open-mindedness.
However, even being able to say that one believes that the other person believes it is true, could be a step in the right direction.

In fact, Harvard Psychiatrist John E. Mack never considered himself a “believer” in the abduction phenomenon. But he did believe that the people who came to him for help, had experienced something, and he believed that they believed what they told him. And he was not able to explain any of it away, they way most of us try to do.
He always claimed that he was just following the data.

This willingness to respect peoples’ stories is part of what made him uniquely successful at helping and treating people who were, even in the best cases, distressed by what they had experienced.
Stepping back from the challenging stories in “Abductions” Ralph Blumenthal’s sensitive and intelligent biography of Mack, is an excellent way to approach this very difficult subject matter.
And it is a worthy testament to the life of a man who had truly heroic intentions.

[Philip Chip Good · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meh. Listened to this after seeing the author discuss him in the Encounters series regarding his interviewing the children in Africa who experienced a UFO sighting. Too much detail on his early life which really didn't seem to have any impact on who he became. The narrator was poor, using at times annoying voices for quoting some of the UFO encounter people, screechy and horrible.

The Encounters show made Mack out to be a rebel who was the only person who would believe these people's stories, which was true. But the book points that he full on believed him without real evidence other than their statements and sometimes by what was revealed through hypnosis. The Encounters show made it out like the psychiatry world just didn't like him giving credance to these quacks but Blumenthal points out a lot of the criticism came from the fact that he didn't and wouldn't follow accepted scientific practices or accept peer input.

In the end, Mack seemed like a talented person in his field who went rogue, possibly for the fame. Also, turns out to be quite a womanizer and maybe a not so good person.

[Ray Schar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Since finishing The Believer (2021) by Ralph Blumenthal a few weeks ago, I've been struggling with the dilemma of a good review of this amazing book. The information given here, especially in the dazzling denouement in this story of John Mack, the "eminent Harvard psychiatrist and Pulitzer-Prize winning biographer of Lawrence of Arabia" who bucked the status quo system in his examination of cases of alien abduction, had left me stunned and speechless, partly because here is valid confirmation of what I've believed for a long time, but also because the implications for the world are nothing short of STUNNING, and also implied in the book is that John Mack seemingly accomplished what Houdini failed to do in his deathbed promise to his wife. I'm being deliberately obtuse because I don't want to spoil the journey for one who may want to read this extraordinary book, which is QUITE the experience, one that a thinking person will never forget!

[George Kanakaris · Rating 5 out of 5]

John Mack, the Harvard psychiatrist and Pulitzer-Prize winning biographer of Lawrence of Arabia and peace activist , who suddenly investigates extraterrestrial phenomena ? How can this be ?The author ,Ralph Blumenthal has written a well researched, balanced and highly readable account of the brilliant and controversial John E Mack.
This book is not about Mack's biography of Lawrence of Arabia , be aware of this.
This book is a deep dive into the life of Harvard's John Mack and a fascinating look at his life.
It is also very captivatingly written.
Recommended.

[Ramey Channell · Rating 5 out of 5]

This extraordinary biography deftly weaves the detailed richness of John Mack's genius and complex life through the historical backdrop of the alien-abduction phenomena. John Mack, an American psychiatrist, writer, professor, and the head of the department of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, was one of the few prominent American intellectuals who saw and said what was, and still is, really at stake in the UFO phenomenon--reality itself. Ralph Blumenthal has so beautifully captured the essence of John Mack's soul and his relentless curiosity.

[Katherine Cook · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent biography of John E. Mack.....maverick of the unknown, healer of the wounded and scholar of T.E. Lawrence.....I'm running to get A Prince of Our Disorder, The Passport and any other book I can find....Most likely, I will be looking through a telescope beckoning intelligent beings to visit while I listen to his audio books on abductions and otherworldly missives......it's going to be a rocky night!

[Bryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't get as much out of this book as I hoped that I would but it was good nonetheless. I liked learning about Dr. John Mack, who I had never heard of before, or, if I had heard of him it did not click. Anyhow, now I will always know about him, and so will you if you read this book. Plus there's a couple interesting case studies I had never heard about before, as well as a couple ones I had.

[Corey · Rating 4 out of 5]

So, I didn't read the kindle edition. I read the standard paperback. Blumenthal did a good job of staying objective a telling the story of John Mack. I could have done with less encounter stories and more hard science. At the end, most thought provoking. At the end of the day, we really know nothing.

[Appsii Lute · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read. Especially after reading his book and seeing him in some docos. This fills in a lot of details like how he found out about that potential abduction case in Africa which comes out of no where in his book. Fleshes him out warts and all which I think is important in this field

[Missy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Never finished this book. Couldn’t get into it

[Pamala · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellently and expertly written account of the fascinating Dr. John Mack.

[Maxwell T · Rating 2 out of 5]

Probably closer to 2.5. Compassionate biography weighed down by steady descent into credulity and confusing chronology.

[Brendan]

Read some of, not going further.

[Philip Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

It has glimpses of gold but otherwise it's a bit all over the place.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Def read this while putting up a show off-broadway for research on another show I’m working on - it provided a great consise look at his life and gave me a lot of great ideaS