Members often ask how to make the public more aware of psychoanalysis. Often, the reply is reach out to media or hold public events. But one of the methods most effective and least talked about in analytic circles is that of trade books.
The publishing world, as you may well know, is basically segmented in two markets: the academic (with which many analysts are familiar); and the trade, comprising those books published for distribution to the general public through booksellers. Many analysts, partial to publishing for their peer audience in the academic world, have overlooked the opportunity and benefits afforded by the trade book market.
Sensitive to just that, member Elizabeth Lloyd Mayer chaired a session at the Winter 2004 Meeting entitled, “Psychoanalysis and Non-Psychoanalytic Publishing: Leaders from the Trade Publishing World Talk about the Psychoanalytic Books They'd Like to See and How to Write Them.”
Mayer, whose forthcoming trade book, Extraordinary Knowing, will be published by Bantam Books (a division of Random House) in 2005, summarizes the values she sees in trade publishing as a way to encourage her fellow members: “Editors and agents are interested in what analysts have to say in a way that is relevant to people's lives.”
Willard Gaylin, member and co-founder of the esteemed Hastings Center, has published more than a dozen trade books over the course of his career. You might even say, he is the parent of successful trade publishing for analysts.
“I have always felt that psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic knowledge weren't just applicable to the therapeutic realm. I was interested in the application of psychoanalytic theory to social problems…and wanted to reach more people and not just preach to the choir,” he said.
Though Gaylin received harsh criticism from his peers for publishing outside the academic realm, he persevered because he wanted to reach others beyond his patients and to help the public, with essentially psychoanalytic perspectives, deal with the social problems confronting them, such as hatred, racism, and sexism.
For another analyst, an exceptional experience in the world of television has led to opportunities in trade publishing. After becoming a contributor to NBC's Today Show, it was just a natural for member Gail Saltz to write a book.
This past May, Saltz published her first book, Becoming Real, which has sold more than 28,000 copies. “The value in publishing came in not using any psychoanalytic jargon and yet still being able to make clear the basic theories of psychoanalysis. That's been the most valuable. Readers have not been turned off…rather, they have been extremely receptive to the fact that there is a dynamic unconscious—one of the major points I make in the book—and that by understanding their unconscious, they can make a change.”
She continued: “What I have written is obvious to analysts, but provocative for the lay public. I found that the use of disguised clinical vignettes was most helpful to readers.
A lot of readers called or wrote because they identified with x case. The vignette hit home and they realized they needed treatment. And at the same time, they realized that in this age of medication and cognitive behavior therapy, there's another way to go.”
Saltz's endeavors in publishing have taken off. She has a children's book coming out in May for parents to use to talk with their child about their child's body and sexuality; and she's at work on a book about women's sexuality.
In 2002, member Elio Frattaroli published his first trade book, Healing the Soul in the Age of the Brain: Why Medication Isn't Enough. “My motivation to write a book was that of looking at a world outside of psychoanalysis—a world which was putting psychoanalysis in trouble.”
Frattaroli was also concerned about the values of psychotherapy being eroded in the hospital where he works. “I saw the essence of the psychoanalytic point of view being threatened,” he said.
“It would not have occurred to me to write a trade book without having had professional colleagues suggest to me that I write for a
Dorothy M. Jeffries is director of public affairs for the American Psychoanalytic Association.
larger audience, primarily because I was the first analyst they had heard talk whom they had understood. As perhaps other analysts have done, I had fallen asleep in so many psychoanalytic lectures that I was determined no one would fall asleep on my words.”
Frattaroli further remarked, “Though my book has not had the impact I hoped for, I do want to say this: The more analysts write with this kind of agenda, the more the weight of everyone's efforts will have an impact.”
In an effort to help parents understand the pre-verbal communication of infants and babies, member Paul Holinger wrote What Babies Say Before They Can Talk: The Nine Signals Infants Use to Express Their Feelings. Technically, the book is about affect theory for the lay audience. Holinger's book has made the Book of the Month Club and has been translated into several languages, including Chinese and Spanish.
“Analysts do a number of things well, and some not so well. We don't focus enough on conveying our work to the public, nor do we focus enough on preventing a pathology. That's what I wanted to do by writing this book.”
One of the most interesting results for Holinger has not been so much from parents as from analysts. “More and more analysts come up to me and say that they understand their patients better after having read my book—that they understand the antecedent of their patients' problems and/or pathology. They also remark that they have become more empathic and more understanding of their patients' feelings,” said Holinger.
Holinger, Mayer, and others have found that their writing has resulted in opportunities for television appearances and speaking engagements.
Another analyst accomplished in trade publishing is Ethel Spector Person, author of Dreams of Love and Fateful Encounters: The Power of Romantic Passion and Feeling Strong: The Achievement of Authentic Power. Her trade books have prompted interviews in many media outlets, including The New York Times and O, the Oprah magazine.
Overwhelmed, but you've got the desire and passion to write and get your message to the public? Then pursue this recommended reading from Toni Burbank, vice president and executive editor for BantamDell, who was a panelist in the session on publishing at the Winter Meeting: Thinking Like Your Editor: How to Write Great Serious Nonfiction—and Get It Published by Susan Rabiner and Alfred Fortunato.