Voices From the Inaudible: The Patients Speak. By Theodor Reik. New York:  Farrar, Straus and Company, Inc., 1964.  200 pp.

This work comprises a collection of quotations from many different individuals who have confided in Reik, interspersed with his own reminiscences and thoughts. The format of the book—ruled pages, section

headings and numbered entries—symbolizes the notebook of Reik, the collector of thoughts, feelings, ideas and impressions.

This is a book to pick up for “snacks,” a book to stimulate the reader to an associative train of thought. What interested this Reviewer are Reik's interpretations and reflections when he reminisces or explains his own thought processes concerning the latent content of statements he has heard, or when he throws new light on some familiar theme. In his free flowing, conversational style of writing, in his enthusiasm for people and their individual modes of expression and in selected examples which eloquently reinforce the theme so dear to his heart, the differences between men and women, Reik has accomplished what he sets out to do. His book is easy to read, can be interrupted at almost any point and be picked up again without loss to the reader. We are not educated or entertained in the conventional mode; rather, avenues of thought are opened up for us to do with what we will.