Book Review – Fires in the Dark
Image: Fires in the Dark by Len Lantz (CC BY-NC-ND)
Synopsis: Len's Star Rating: 10 out of 10. A fascinating book that explores healing and healers of trauma and mental illness.
BY LEN LANTZ, MD / 11.19.2023; No. 115
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Star Rating – 10 out of 10
Rating guide: 1 = horrible, 5 = average and 10 = wow
Author
Kay Redfield Jamison
About the author
Kay Redfield Jamison is a researcher with over 100 published academic articles, a clinical psychologist, and the author of several bestselling books. She is an international authority on bipolar disorder and co-authored the two-volume text, Manic-Depressive Illness, the first comprehensive book on bipolar disorder incorporating both research and clinical treatments. Dr. Jamison earned her BA and MA in clinical psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles, and her CPhil and PhD at UCLA. She currently serves as the Dalio Professor in Mood Disorders and Psychiatry and the Co-Director of the Mood Disorders Center at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
General description
Fires in the Dark is a book that examines the history of people who have suffered and survived trauma and depression and what unexpected attributes their doctors and therapists possessed that made them remarkable healers. Kay Redfield Jamison organized her writing into three sections:
The Mind at War: Healing the Broken
Healers of the Mind: Priest, Physician, and Psychotherapist
The Healing Arts: Hero, Artist, and Storyteller
In the first section, the author shares stories of well-known doctors and nurses who lived through the First World War. The stories share how each person endeavored to overcome their trauma and mental illness. In the second section, the author shares some of her personal experiences and observations of mental illness and healing. The final section looks at the good that can come from adversity and includes stories of resilience in historical figures and healing via the arts.
Unique and most important aspects
While Fires in the Dark includes the personal experiences of Kay Redfield Jamison, it is not a memoir like the book that made her famous, An Unquiet Mind. In Fires in the Dark, Dr. Jamison thoroughly examines what it takes to heal and be healed of trauma and mental illness through the lens of famous historical figures. It is no wonder that the author was nominated for a Pulitzer in 2018. Her writing is powerful, engaging, and thorough. The author completed extensive research in writing Fires in the Dark, which has an over-50-page bibliography. Dr. Jamison has extensively explored this subject to tell the stories of the anguish and recovery of famous figures of the 20th century. From the lives of well-known physicians and healers including herself, Kay Redfield Jamison examines and eloquently describes a lifeline of hope that extends between people who are suffering emotionally and their healers.
Best quotes
“There is no clinical or scientific reason to argue a false choice between medication and psychotherapy. Psychotherapeutics, as Rivers said, is the oldest branch of medicine; as such, it is deeply embedded in the needs of our race.”
“Great healers learn how to repair and make whole the sick mind. This book looks at what makes a great healer, and which qualities are shared by healer and priest.”
“Work heals. William Osler referred to work as the ‘true balm of hurt minds,’ and it is both part of the journey and, at times, the endpoint. Work is an active part of healing; it sustains, reaffirms, and replenishes.”
“Trust is critical, but reason is likewise essential to understanding the causes of suffering.”
“Psychotherapy, like mortar and pestle, breaks down psychological suffering into finer elements of memory, cause, defense, aspiration, and apprehension; it then reconstitutes them into new and stronger arrangements of mind. A deeper knowledge of self is critical to understanding the world as it is, not as one desires it to be. Such knowledge, well-utilized, frees up energy to explore new things, to master, and to mend.”
“Many who adhere to particular forms of psychotherapy find it counterintuitive that the relationship between therapist and patient determines the outcome of treatment more than the particular school of psychotherapy.”
“The most important thing my psychiatrist did during that first meeting was to give me hope that I would get better. I didn’t believe this at the time, all seemed futile, but his belief that I would get well, and stay well, continued throughout my treatment. It was undeviating, even during my darkest depressions. Slowly, some of his faith got through. His was not a naïve or perfunctorily offered hope; it was clinically informed and seemed unassailable.”
“Now, when I talk with students who have been manic or severely depressed and they ask me how I made it through, I start with the words of Josh Logan, Sloan Wilson, and my psychiatrist: It is hard. You can do it. It is really hard.”
“Anticipate the future; it will disappoint. There will be grief and suffering. Build seawalls against them. Learn. In learning is mastery; in mastery is healing.”
Who would enjoy this book?
Readers who have read and enjoyed previous books by the author are likely to enjoy Fires in the Dark.
Who would not enjoy this book?
People who are primarily interested in reading a memoir by the author are unlikely to enjoy Fires in the Dark and instead would probably prefer Dr. Jamison’s memoir, An Unquiet Mind.
Conclusion
Fires in the Dark is a fascinating book that explores healing and healers of trauma and mental illness.