The Politics of Experience and The Bird of Paradise

The Politics of Experience and The Bird of Paradise

Summary

In ‘The Politics of Experience’ and the visionary ‘Bird of Paradise’, R.D. Laing shows how the straitjacket of conformity imposed on us all leads to intense feelings of alienation and a tragic waste of human potential. He throws into question the notion of normality, examines schizophrenia and psychotherapy, transcendence and ‘us and them’ thinking, and illustrates his ideas with a remarkable case history of a ten-day psychosis. ‘We are bemused and crazed creatures,’ Laing suggests. This outline of ‘a thoroughly self-conscious and self-critical human account of man’ represents a major attempt to understand our deepest dilemmas and sketch in solutions.

‘Everyone in contemporary psychiatry owes something to R.D. Laing’ Anthony Clare, the Guardian.

About the author

R. D. Laing

Born in 1927, R.D. Laing was a Scottish psychiatrist whose groundbreaking writing focused on mental illness. His work was particularly centred on the causes, treatment and experience of psychosis. He died in 1989.
Learn More

More from this Author

Sign up to the Penguin Newsletter

For the latest books, recommendations, author interviews and more