All in the mind - a book review

This article concerns the novel written and published by Alastair Campbell in 2008, entitled "All in the mind". For those of you to whom the name does not immediately ring a bell: Alastair Campbell was at one time press secretary to Tony Blair and in fact advanced to 'official spokesman and director of communications and strategy', but reportedly from the end of the 2005 election campaign, he has mainly been engaged in writing.

This book (his debut novel) is acclaimed by no less than Stephen Fry as brilliant and compelling and that is indeed how I experienced it, once I got past my initial reservation against pocketbooks full of PR blurbs praising them to high heaven (so you get the feeling you don't need to read them anymore.....)

The story is about a top psychiatrist in London and a number of his patients (as well as about personal relationships and situations of all characters involved).  Initially, the psychotherapist's therapeutic interventions seemed curiously inept, as did his lack of assertiveness in his personal life - but gradually the various storylines entangle you (the reader) and make it hard to put the book down because you want to know what happens next...

Human foibles and feats, failure, compassion and tragedy are all presented with eloquence and a (to my mind pleasing) sense of the absurd.

Some of the characters' philosophising does require in the reader a bit of stretching the imagination - being so poetic, insightful and phrased 'just so'. The ending too presents a magical amount of insight and understanding (that does not quite match my experience, but hey.....)

Nevertheless, this book is - besides a wacking good read - worth reading for 3 things:

1. the marvelous piece on 'humility'
2. descriptions of depressive states that are as harrowing as realistic
3. most of all, it provides food for thought regarding selfcare for any kind of professionals (and the higher placed - the more difficult that appears).

Finally, to reinforce the last theme: Why have people been saying for so long that it is better to give than to receive - something that appears to have led to many kind and compassionate people having difficulty accepting and receiving help, or even such things as compliments, appreciation, confirmation, admiration, etc.

To gracefully receive as well as give perhaps amounts to a true "art of living". In the situation in which help is needed, it also amounts to a primary (survival) need.