Review
Corrupting the Young: and Other Stories of a Family Therapist.
Moshe and Tesse Lang
Rene Gordon Pty Ltd, 1986, 169 pages. $12.95 (Paperback).
This is a delightful book written by people who are caring, capable, innovative and good listeners. Moshe, the senior author, is a psychology trained family therapist with a 20 year experience in Melbourne. Tess is a medico with a special interest in counselling people and their families. She has worked in a children’s haematology unit and a cardiac rehabilitation unit in Melbourne.
Anecdotes illustrate the successes and failures of the author’s dealings with families who present to them in difficulty. Also mentioned are the author’s reactions to these situations. Stories of their life experiences and the search for a normal family. (Shades of the ancient Greek’s search for a happy man.) The style is succinct and nonjudgmental. I have always found anecdotes an excellent way to learn and remember. Among other things, the interpretation of events is an individual reaction, based on ones’ own prejudices. This means a different conclusion is often reached by the listener than was intended by the teller.
We general practitioners have the interaction among families as our life’s work and although this book is written with the lay reader in mind it is a particularly relevant text for us.
It is a delight to read – buy it.
Reviewed by Chris Hogan.
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Reference:
Hogan, C. (1989). Corrupting the Young (and other stories of a family therapist). Australian Family Physician, 18(4), 382-383.
© 2013 Australian Family Physician. Reproduced with permission from The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners.