The Listener: A Psychoanalyst Examines His Life

It can be embarassing sometimes for a reader to hear about sexual desire-- particularly when it reveals so well that forbidden place men seem to know. Somehow, Wheelis avoids going overboard. At one point, he admits to the reader that if we like him, he has failed to truly reveal himself. Perhaps the reason I like him is that I am thankful. Usually male sexual desire is loaded-- we (as men) are either taught to embrace it (machismo) or chastise it. In this case I it was simply felt and explained.

I am editor of the professional journal "Psychotherapy In Australia" and also a therapist. So I've read many many books on, by, and for therapy and therapists. Allen Wheelis' "The Listener" is utterly distinctive and forced me to confront myself about just how honest I have been with myself in my own life. It is also beautifully written. I've read this book three times now, ans gained more each time, and I've set off on a quest to read all his other books. Irvin Yalom has reviewed this book by asking if a more honest autobiography has ever been written. I have no fear in answering "No".

Allen Wheelis who has written a series of extraordinary novels and professional psychiatric books, offers a moving, beautiful, and powerfully evocative memoir. Psychoanalysts, he says, know too much to hide behind self-decption and this astonishing book reveals the shape of a life seen straight, seen without distorting lenses.

They say bitter truth is the hardest to swallow, but what comes out of this beautifully written memoir is that real life, particularly as it involves the search for love relationships, can only grow out of a realistic appraisal of the possibilities. Dr. Wheelis has listened to patients for decades and spares no one (least of all himself) in this softly rendered demand for acceptance of The Way Things Are. This book, and, the listener himself, visits your very soul--and leaves it a better place.

This remarkable memoir will become a classic for its sparse yet elegant portrayal of a man's life told with ruthless honesty, crystalline clarity, and moving effect. The reader is pulled into the unfolding story of a life often painful yet ever struggling toward mastery. The subtitle reference to psychoanalysis ought not be off-putting. This is a memoir informed by the knowledge that has come from intimate exposure to other people's lives as well as the author's own, but devoid of jargon or cant. Engaging and masterful, an outstanding read.