The Schopenhauer Cure
A Novel
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4.7 • 3 Ratings
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
From the
internationally bestselling author of Love's
Executioner and When
Nietzsche Wept, comes a
novel of group therapy with a cast of memorably wounded characters struggling
to heal pain and change lives
Suddenly confronted with his own
mortality after a routine checkup, eminent psychotherapist Julius Hertzfeld is
forced to reexamine his life and work -- and seeks out Philip Slate, a sex
addict whom he failed to help some twenty years earlier. Yet Philip claims to
be cured -- miraculously transformed by the pessimistic teachings of German
philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer -- and is, himself, a philosophical counselor in
training.
Philip's dour, misanthropic
stance compels Julius to invite Philip to join his intensive therapy group in
exchange for tutoring on Schopenhauer. But with mere months left, life may be
far too short to help Philip or to compete with him for the hearts and minds of
the group members. And then again, it might be just long enough.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Having taken on the origins of psychotherapy in the popular When Nietzsche Wept, psychiatrist-novelist Yalom now turns to group therapy and the thinker sometimes known as the "philosopher of pessimism," in this meticulous, occasionally slow-moving book. Julius Hertzfeld, a successful therapist in San Francisco, is shocked by the news that he suffers from terminal cancer. Moved to reassess his life's work, he contacts Philip Slate, whose three years of therapy for sexual addiction Julius describes as an "old-time major-league failure." Philip is now training to be a therapist himself, guided by the writings of Arthur Schopenhauer, and he offers to teach Julius about Schopenhauer as a way of helping him deal with his looming death. Julius and Philip strike a deal: Julius will serve as Philip's clinical supervisor, but only if Philip joins the ongoing therapy group Julius leads. To complicate matters further, Pam, a group member, is one of the hundreds of women Philip seduced and then rejected. Yalom often refers to his books as "teaching novels," and his re-creation of a working therapy group is utterly convincing. At the same time, his approach can be overly documentary, as the inner workings of therapy, often repetitious and self-referential, absorb much of the novel's momentum. A parallel account of Schopenhauer's life sheds light on the philosopher's intellectual triumphs and emotional difficulties.
