This is a timely and passionate book about the power of western drama, throughout its history, to transform our understanding of ourselves and of society. It is timely to be reminded of the natural affinities between psychoanalysis and sociology, of the links between the project of understanding the inner life of individuals and the complexity of lives lived in families, societies and political systems. It is passionate in the driving force behind it, which is the authors’ love of drama and their conviction about its vital truth-bearing function in society from Greek to modern times.

The content derives from a series of seminars the authors have been teaching