Title: Speaking with the devil : a dialogue with evil /
Authors: Goldberg, Carl.
Publisher: Viking,
Year: 1996
Subjects: Antisocial Personality Disorder psychology; Antisocial personality disorders.; Mentally ill offenders.; Good and evil Psychological aspects; Psychopaths; Acting out (Psychology); Dangerously mentally ill.; Violent offenders.
Abstract: Based on thirty years of clinical work with patients, Goldberg attempts to explain the psychological basis of malevolent behavior by incorporating heretofore unrecognized sources of deformed personality development into the existing body of knowledge. Approaching his subject from many perspectives - psychology, philosophy, theology, mythology, jurisprudence, and literature - he at once provides a cultural and historical overview of malevolence. Through that prism, supported by a five-step theory, Goldberg charts the causes and development of the malevolent personality and its resistance to self-examination. He illuminates the developmental sequence of that personality through case studies of his own patients that represent a progression of stages - from a young child shamed and humiliated by caretakers to an adult who commits malevolent acts.
Contents: The problem of malevolence -- The history of evil and its psychological theories -- Shame and malevolence -- Child of scorn -- The role of the double in malevolence -- Child of the devil -- The role of the mirror in human suffering -- Transition from victim to perpetrator of malevolence -- Madness and malevolence -- Experimental malevolence -- Courage and fanaticism -- The forging of the malevolent personality -- Friendship as the basis of psychological healing -- Healing shame and despair -- Constructive responses to malevolence.