what you get here

This is not a blog which opines on current events. It rather uses incidents, books (old and new), links and papers to muse about our social endeavours.
So old posts are as good as new! And lots of useful links!

The Bucegi mountains - the range I see from the front balcony of my mountain house - are almost 120 kms from Bucharest and cannot normally be seen from the capital but some extraordinary weather conditions allowed this pic to be taken from the top of the Intercontinental Hotel in late Feb 2020

Saturday, April 20, 2019

Salad days??

It is approaching Easter in Romania – Friday 26th to be precise will be Good Friday here….
As a lapsed Christian, this has no particular meaning for me and I have never been able to agree with TS Eliot’s statement that April is “the cruellest month”. That, for me in the mid 1980s in Scotland, was rather November when I was afflicted for 3 consecutive winters by what the scientists then had started to call the S.A.D syndrome (better known to Churchill as his “black dog”).
This was a simple reflection of the career quandary which had trapped me as I tried for more than a decade to straddle both an academic and political career – killing my chances, in the process, of success in either…..Students drove me out of academia and I was soon jobless – still with my prominent political position but the time to reflect on what had gone wrong and how I might avoid future bouts of depression.
I had the beginnings of a European network - which I cultivated further – but it was the fall of the Berlin Wall which presented me with the opportunity – seized with both hands - to be the "consultant" I  then became for the next 25 years….(see my Just Words for a definition of that term!)

But nowadays this time of the year tends to be marked by 2 rather different but significant and linked events.
The bad one is the onset of pollen allergy…..with all that entails with sneezing and stuffed nose
The good one is the arrival of nettles, lettuce, spring garlic and onion, radish, red pepper et al in the markets here – particularly the Obor one a few tramstops away. Allowing the concocting of nettle stew with mamaliga; and of wonderful salads with the freshly-picked greens with grated carrots, bread crumbs, olives, walnuts, apple vinegar, goat cheese and olive oil….

Far from being a cruel month, April was (in the late 1980s) when I emerged from what was almost like a hibernation. Ever since then, however, I have had great sympathy for those who suffer – the most prominent Brits being Stephen Fry and Alastair Campbell. At the time Philip Toynbee was about the only prominent person admitting to the condition (I remember reading his “Part of a Journey – autobiographical notes 1977-79”) although Dorothy Rowe’s Depression – the way out of your prison;(1983) became, deservedly, a best-seller.
Of course, as I have slowly slid into retirement, it is not surprising that the black dog sometimes barks. So Matt Haig’s recent book was a useful reminder for me – although I was disappointed with its self-indulgence and think that Hari’s Lost Connections (2018) is a more useful read – with

chapters on the suggested reconnections focus on: a) other people, b) ‘social prescribing’, c) meaningful work, d) meaningful values, e) sympathetic joy and overcoming an addiction to the self, f) acknowledging and overcoming childhood trauma, and g) restoring the future.

This is a good review – and this a video of the author making a presentation about the book which I found yesterday and which I simply cannot put down, it is such a gripping read as he traces his journey from a decade of popping pills, followed by several years of asking questions, reading research and tracking down what seemed to be the people and places to help him answer the questions....On the way he targets myths, medics and the pharma companies and comes up with deeply political answers about the power of collective action.....I hope to do a separate post on the issue soon....
 ..
Was it neurologist Oliver Sachs who started (in the mid 90s) what has become the genre of literary medical writing? I was aware of his “The Man who mistook his wife for a hat” but never read his works. It was Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal which alerted me a few years back to the new genre – well represented by Edinburgh GP Gavin Francis’s Shapeshifters (2018) which I picked up last week from “Carturesti and Friends”
And it’s appropriate that it should be Francis who reviews another book which came from Vlad’s place – The Novel Cure – an A-Z of Literary Remedies - a delightful compendium of reading recommendations for those suffering from various travails….The Guardian even has a book clinic in the same vein….The authors of “The Novel Cure” have a website https://thenovelcure.com which serves up new offerings but, sadly, my PC denies me access……

It gives me the thought that someone should do a non-fiction version.......using indices of social and economic malaise to suggest the most accessible non-fiction reads???????

Resource on Depression (starting with the oldest)
One of the few books which was around in those dark ages, Rowe was a journalist and “agony aunt” and has a very easy tone

Life – and how to survive it; John Cleese and Robin Skynner (1996)
definitely one of the most helpful books of the decade ! A therapist and leading British comic (!) have a Socratic dialogue about the principles of healthy (family) relationships and then use these to explore the preconditions for healthy organisations and societies: and for leadership viz -
- valuing and respecting others
 - ability to communicate
- willingness to wield authority firmly but always for the general welfare and with as much consultation as possible while handing power back when the crisis is over)
- capacity to face reality squarely
- flexiblity and willingness to change
- belief in values above and beyond the personal or considerations of party.


Malignant Sadness; the anatomy of depression; Lewis Wolpert (1999)
Looks quite excellent

A much praised book, I must confess that I found its discursive style off-putting. Solomon is an essayist – although fully one third of the (large) book consists of notes. But no attempt is to break the relentless text up into headed sections to give us a hint of where the text is going

The Compassionate Mind; Paul Gilbert (2009)
This is also a bit forbidding with almost 600 pages but us well structured

Reasons to stay alive; Matt Haig (2015)
A bit too self-indulgent – but read for yourself Its short

Rip it UP – the as if principle; Richard Wiseman (2016)
One of the quotes which adorn my blog is from William James - “I will act as if what I do makes a difference”. In this entertaining and original book, Wiseman sets out a philosophy that encourages us to discipline our minds

Lost Connections; Johann Hari (2018) I came to this book prepared (by Hari’s reputation for plagiarism) to dislike it but was completely won over……


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