Understanding Psychological Trauma Through Literature (draft)

As a psychology graduate student, in the 1970’s, I came across an edited volume, The Abnormal Personality Through Literature, by Alan A. and Sue Smart Stone (1966), which presented long passages of great works of fiction to describe psychiatric syndromes and psychotherapeutics. I thought it a great idea then, and still do. The work you are reading attempts to apply their method more specifically, to just the destructive psychological effects of trauma and efforts to overcome them. The other variations from Stone and Stone include the use of shorter passages, and comments on changes in the way trauma has been recognized over the years, since it has been officially acknowledged in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) as the official United States standard.

A reasonably clean rough draft: