From Mesmer to Freud: Magnetic Sleep and the Roots of Psychological Healing

Rating:
Summary: Serious and educational, yet fascinating and readable.
Review: I've been reading on the topic of hypnosis for about 15 years now, both formally and informally as far as education goes. In this book Adam Crabtree has given the best education on the topic I have ever encountered -- so much so, that I realized with some degree of horror how UNeducated I was about the subject, despite all these years of interest and study.

Crabtree does more than just present the yawningly-dull textbook aspect of history here -- HIS book IS an interesting read, despite being so educational. He also presents the personal, social and cultural dynamics that have played out throughout the history of this topic and with the personalities involved. The book gives important attention to the many qualified individuals who studied, practiced and wrote about the topic from Mesmer's era onward. Modern day authors and textbooks that cover the topic of hypnosis and related psychology tend to mostly-ignore anything more than a few decades old, with little more than a mention, as if only "modern" science is important (and there is always the unspoken inference in modern education that Mesmer, despite that he was well credentialed for his day, was some kind of idiot to go on about "magnetic fluid from the stars" and such).

What Crabtree demonstrates by unwinding the tapestry of this history is that by not paying more attention to the history, we have in fact failed to see what got lost in the politically correct shuffle of time, what got ignored in the West's attempt to find answers that could be explained solely by biochemical, and what got rewritten and UNwritten in the history which has been, as always, written by 'the victors' -- in this case, the party-line of Western medicine.

In this book, Crabtree does not once utter the word "chi." Never does he even hint that this "discovery" of Mesmer's MIGHT have been the West's actual discovery of pranic work (chi, or energy) -- attendant with its many variable focuses (some physical, some psychological, etc.) and the resultant confusion that brings for a culture unused to considering those things all part of the same spectrum, and which is trying to nail down a "thing" that it "is". And yet the inclusion of excerpts from the writings of Mesmer and many others in the pre-James Braid days makes it so patently obvious (to ME in any case) that this is what they were talking about that I couldn't help but exclaim out loud. Taken from that perspective (by anybody with a little bit of knowledge about Eastern medicine et al.) the history takes on a new richness and the subject a whole new wonder. This is my take on it though; one can't say that Crabtree ever said any such thing. This is just what I got out of it.

Anyway, the book is an excellent education about hypnosis, its development, the people involved, and the fascinating topic of what it's been used for, how and why and what some of the fascinating results were. Like any good book, it leaves you with as many ideas about questions as it does facts and answers (often about things you never even thought to ask).

I recommend the book highly. It's probably not a general-public book, in the sense that one needs a brain and an attention span to enjoy it -- it's a "serious" book. But for anyone interested in this topic, and especially those educated about it via modern schools, I strongly recommend it. I enjoyed it a great deal.

Rating:
Summary: Serious and educational, yet fascinating and readable.
Review: I've been reading on the topic of hypnosis for about 15 years now, both formally and informally as far as education goes. In this book Adam Crabtree has given the best education on the topic I have ever encountered -- so much so, that I realized with some degree of horror how UNeducated I was about the subject, despite all these years of interest and study.

Crabtree does more than just present the yawningly-dull textbook aspect of history here -- HIS book IS an interesting read, despite being so educational. He also presents the personal, social and cultural dynamics that have played out throughout the history of this topic and with the personalities involved. The book gives important attention to the many qualified individuals who studied, practiced and wrote about the topic from Mesmer's era onward. Modern day authors and textbooks that cover the topic of hypnosis and related psychology tend to mostly-ignore anything more than a few decades old, with little more than a mention, as if only "modern" science is important (and there is always the unspoken inference in modern education that Mesmer, despite that he was well credentialed for his day, was some kind of idiot to go on about "magnetic fluid from the stars" and such).

What Crabtree demonstrates by unwinding the tapestry of this history is that by not paying more attention to the history, we have in fact failed to see what got lost in the politically correct shuffle of time, what got ignored in the West's attempt to find answers that could be explained solely by biochemical, and what got rewritten and UNwritten in the history which has been, as always, written by 'the victors' -- in this case, the party-line of Western medicine.

In this book, Crabtree does not once utter the word "chi." Never does he even hint that this "discovery" of Mesmer's MIGHT have been the West's actual discovery of pranic work (chi, or energy) -- attendant with its many variable focuses (some physical, some psychological, etc.) and the resultant confusion that brings for a culture unused to considering those things all part of the same spectrum, and which is trying to nail down a "thing" that it "is". And yet the inclusion of excerpts from the writings of Mesmer and many others in the pre-James Braid days makes it so patently obvious (to ME in any case) that this is what they were talking about that I couldn't help but exclaim out loud. Taken from that perspective (by anybody with a little bit of knowledge about Eastern medicine et al.) the history takes on a new richness and the subject a whole new wonder. This is my take on it though; one can't say that Crabtree ever said any such thing. This is just what I got out of it.

Anyway, the book is an excellent education about hypnosis, its development, the people involved, and the fascinating topic of what it's been used for, how and why and what some of the fascinating results were. Like any good book, it leaves you with as many ideas about questions as it does facts and answers (often about things you never even thought to ask).

I recommend the book highly. It's probably not a general-public book, in the sense that one needs a brain and an attention span to enjoy it -- it's a "serious" book. But for anyone interested in this topic, and especially those educated about it via modern schools, I strongly recommend it. I enjoyed it a great deal.