The Quiet Furies: Man and Disorder

by Elton B. McNeil

The voyeur finds it necessary to look rather than to do, and the reader of casebooks may similarly be tempted to peek at the secrets of others solely for the purpose of reassuring himself about his own superior stability. This book was intended to make more familiar and less mysterious the kinds of disorder to which all human lives are subject to a greater or lesser degree. In these cases are you, me, everyone, states author McNeil. They do not show sickness of a biological sort; they demonstrate how the normal problems of living can escalate beyond recognition. This is an account of the hidden selves of a number of people whose problems and inappropriate behavior led them to seek or need assistance in being productive participants in our society. Psychotherapy is one means of restoring order where chaos has come to prevail but it is only one of many means and it is still an imperfect tool. People have reorganized themselves without professional help since time began and there is little reason to believe that self-help will not always be the most vital factor in adjustment. Psychotherapists are needed as much to organize the resources of those closest to the victim of disorder as they are to restore psychological order to the sufferer himself. The events in the disordered lives reported here are true, says the author, and “as accurate as I can make them given the vagaries of memory and the inevitable distortions of time and distance.” Participants’ identities have, of course, been disguised.

Genres: Psychology

207 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1967