The Book of the Mind: Key Writings on the Mind from Plato and the Buddha Through Shakespeare, Descartes, and Freud to the Latest Discoveries of Neuroscience

Rating:
Summary: Comprehensive historical study of the mind
Review: Collected together here is an impressive set of writings on the mind, from the earliest accounts to the most cutting edge consciousness research. The writings include fiction, letters, case notes and formal studies.

The editor illuminates the contributions through introductions to each of the six sections, i.e. Perception, Memory, Emotion, Thought, Consciousness and Self, plus commentaries that contextualise each individual piece.

The list of contributors include Alfred Adler, Aristotle, St. Augustine, Francis Bacon, William Blake, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Sigmund Freud, Gautama Buddha, Daniel Goleman, Aldous Huxley, William James, Carl Jung, Oscar Wilde and Virginia Woolf.

The book is revealing to say the least, as it encompasses some of humanity's most significant attempts to understand the mind and how it works. Some passages are also very inspiring and the editor has done a splendid job of tying these writings together over space and time.