Table Of Content‘This welcomed book is recommended for those who wish to consider some
potentially life changing implications of, rather than use, philosophy for their thera-
peutic practices.’
Professor Del Loewenthal, Chair of Psychotherapy and Counselling,
University of Roehampton
‘By reaching outside the increasingly narrow world of psychotherapy, this book offers us
much needed resources to re-examine current practice from the proper perspective of
the whole of human experience. T he writing here returns us to a maturity of thought
that is currently lacking in the profession of psychotherapy. W e are invited to expand
our questions and assumptions beyond “evidence-based treatments”, to include philo-
sophical and creative insights. In the process, we regain a little of the personal humility
that makes psychotherapy therapeutic in the first place. A real breath of fresh air.’
Dr Greg Madison, author and psychotherapist
‘Offering a clear dialogue between therapy and philosophy, Therapy and the Counter-
tradition is a much needed and most welcome book. In an age of what the editors
refer to as “superficial pragmatism”, this book promotes and provides philosophical
integrity, which is often lacking in training and practice. Focusing on the work
of twelve specific philosophers, a poet and a novelist, the book is wide-ranging,
informative, and stimulating, while remaining coherent. This is a book for thinking
and thoughtful therapists. I commend the editors and recommend it highly.’
Dr Keith Tudor, Professor of Psychotherapy, Auckland University of Technology,
Aotearoa New Zealand, and co-author of Person-centred Therapy:
A Clinical Philosophy (Routledge, 2006)
‘A tour de force of critical insights – from Nietzsche to Wittgenstein, from Keats to
Kierkegaard – Manu Bazzano and Julie Webb have provided a rich banquet of ideas
that are orthogonal to the complacency of tradition and the banality of contemporary
psychotherapy. Drawing on a wide range of themes: ethics, politics, art, poetry and lan-
guage, Therapy and the Counter-Tradition revitalizes philosophy as a way of life, offering
a new infusion of vitality into the healing of the soul.’
Ronald E. Purser, PhD, Professor of Management,
San Francisco State University
‘In an age when therapy’s literature is dominated by programmatic, allegedly
evidence-based pretensions to scientificity and control, with meaning routinely
reduced to superficiality and utility, we desperately need far more material that will
fructify imaginations, embrace paradox and the ineffable, and challenge the tradi-
tion of modernity and rationalism that, in the wrong hands, only impoverish the
human condition. This exciting book uses engagements with key philosophers, like
Nietzsche Wittgenstein, Butler, Camus, Deleuze, Irigaray, Kierkegaard, Merleau-
Ponty, Sartre and Schopenhauer (amongst others), to do just that – a splendid text
that is “full of being and becoming”, with (thankfully) not an “evidence-based”
claim in sight. My only (deep) regret is that this book didn’t exist when I was train-
ing as a therapist 25 years ago.’
Dr Richard House, former Senior Lecturer in Psychotherapy, University of
Roehampton, and author of Therapy Beyond Modernity (Karnac)
and In, Against and Beyond Therapy (PCCS)
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THERAPY AND THE
COUNTER-TRADITION
Therapy and the Counter-tradition: The edge of philosophy brings together leading exponents of
contemporary psychotherapy, philosophers and writers in order to explore how philosophical
ideas may inform therapy work. The authors discuss particular philosophers who have influenced
their lives and therapeutic practice, while questioning how counselling and psychotherapy can
address human ‘wholeness’, despite the ascendancy of rationality, regulation and diagnosis. It also
seeks to acknowledge the distinct lack of philosophical input and education in counselling and
psychotherapy training.
The chapters are rooted in the counter-tradition, whose diverse manifestations include
humanism, skepticism, fideism, as well as the opening of philosophy and psychology to
poetry and the arts. This collection of thought-provoking chapters will help open the discus-
sion within the psychological therapies, by providing therapists with critical philosophical
references, which will help broaden their knowledge and the scope of their practice.
Therapy and the Counter-tradition: The edge of philosophy will be of interest to mental health
professionals, practitioners, counselling and psychotherapy trainees and trainers, and academ-
ics tutoring or studying psychology. It will also appeal to those interested in psychology,
meditation, personal development and philosophy.
Manu Bazzano is a psychotherapist and supervisor in private practice and visiting lecturer
at various schools and colleges, most notably Roehampton University. He teaches philoso-
phy in adult education and has a background in rock music and Zen Buddhism. Bazzano has
authored numerous books and is co-editor of Person-centred and Experiential Psychotherapies, as
well as book review editor of Self & Society: An International Journal for Humanistic Psychology.
www.manubazzano.com
Julie Webb (MA, MBACP) has a background in training, literature and philosophy. She is a
counselling lecturer at University Campus Suffolk and a humanistic counsellor and supervi-
sor in private practice in Cambridge. She has previously had an established private practice
in Shrewsbury and worked as a counselling lecturer for five years at Shrewsbury College of
Arts & Technology, offering training and CPD. www.juliewebbcounselling.com
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THERAPY AND THE
COUNTER-TRADITION
The edge of philosophy
Edited by Manu Bazzano
and Julie Webb
First published 2016
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business.
© 2016 selection and editorial matter, Manu Bazzano and Julie Webb;
individual chapters, the contributors
The right of the editors to be identified as the authors of the editorial
material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted
in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Bazzano, Manu, editor. | Webb, Julie, editor.
Title: Therapy and the counter-tradition / edited by Manu Bazzano
and Julie Webb.
Description: Milton, Park, Abingdon ; New York, NY : Routledge, [2016] |
Includes bibliographical references.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015039182| ISBN 9781138905870 (hbk) |
ISBN 9781138905887 (pbk) | ISBN 9781315680194 (ebk)
Subjects: LCSH: Psychotherapy—Philosophy.
Classification: LCC RC437.5 .T48 2016 | DDC 616.89/14—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015039182
ISBN: 978-1-138-90587-0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-90588-7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-68019-4 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
Not how the world is, but that it is, is the mystery.
Ludwig Wittgenstein
I change too quickly: my today refutes my yesterday.
Friedrich Nietzsche
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CONTENTS
Contributors xii
Introduction 1
Manu Bazzano and Julie Webb
PART I
The threshold experience 7
1 Changelings: the self in Nietzsche’s psychology 9
Manu Bazzano
2 What can therapists learn from Kierkegaard? 23
John Lippitt
3 John Keats and negative capability:
the psychotherapist’s X-factor? 34
Diana Voller
4 That piece of supreme art, a man’s life 45
Nick Duffell
5 Tears of joy: Pascal’s ‘Night of Fire’ 58
Subhaga Gaetano Failla
