‘Extremely engaging… A book full of good moments and humane insights.’

Alan Ryan, Observer

This book collects the essays of one of England’s best-known and most distinguished psychiatrists. Its theme is creativity. What internal dynamic forces artists, scientists and politicians to devote so much time and energy to creative invention? Anthony Storr weighs and tests Freud’s theory that creativity is the result of dissatisfaction by examining the impulses which drove such figures as Churchill, Kafka and Newton.

Whether he is exploring the ‘divine discontent’ that motivates creativity, analysing Jung’s mid-life crisis, assessing the psychology of jealousy in Othello or denouncing the abuses of psychiatry, Storr brings wisdom, erudition and compassion to all his subjects in this highly readable and human collection, which is accessible to those who know nothing about psychoanalysis as well as to those who know a great deal.