The Rockefeller File by Gary Allen

Product Description

GARY ALLEN's shocking, true story of the most powerful family in America. How the House of Rockefeller became a political and financial dynasty. The New World Order it plans to creat - and control.
Product Details
Amazon Sales Rank: #243820 in Books
Published on: 1976-06
Binding: Paperback
195 pages
Editorial Reviews

About the Author
GARY ALLEN was one of America's premier investigative reporters, writing primarily about the uses and abuses of great wealth and power. He was a Contributing Editor of American Opinion magazine for more than two decades, where over 200 of his article appeared. His eight previous books include: NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY, TED KENNEDY: IN OVER HIS HEAD. Millions of copies of his books have been sold. He finished the manuscript for SAY "NO" TO THE NEW WORLD ORDER shortly before his death in November 1986.
Customer Reviews

Highly entertaining
The fact that this book was published 32 years ago makes it even more interesting. I'm sure that Allen was portrayed as a delusional, tin foil hat conspiracy theorist back in the day. But his dire warnings and predictions have largely come to pass though things took a little longer than he apparently anticipated.
The book does contain a couple factual errors in my humble opinion. He obviously has an axe to grind. The book is too small to properly flesh out many of the accusations. So it increases the readers quest for more books that help explain the mysteries behind the latter day unveiling of the 'new world order'. If you still do not realize that a mean and radical 'new world order' is being unveiled, you must have fallen off of the pumpkin cart and suffered an acute cranial injury.
It is vastly entertaining above almost anything else. I have suffered through several books that were strictly aimed at documentation and education. Much like a long distance runner, I find myself looking forward to the end and being proud of finishing text book like tomes. This is absolutely not the case here.
As for me, I'm not ready to believe that the Rockefellers are solely responsible for the negative effects of their 'terminator like' advance towards absolute world domination. I suspect it is at least equally due to the greed and avarice of legions of Rockefeller lietenants who also aspire to stratospheric 'Rockefeller wealth'.
These are exciting times. This book clearly explains much of the history that went into the modern day climax of all of the brilliant and hard work put into the Rockefeller dynasty over the past century.
We all indirectly work for the Rockefellers whether we know it or not. The Rock has got a piece of you.

This book brings the globalist conspiracy into focus 30 years after the fact!
The Rockefeller File was written over thirty years ago but so much of what this book claimed that the global elite have in store for the world has come to pass and proven to be true that it really makes your jaw drop.

One example are plans for something along the lines of the European Union, NAFTA, and North American Union being implemented, which has all of course come to pass. Another is the turning of communist China into a slave plantation for the big money capitalists of the world at the expense of the American manufacturing base and worker. People seem to forget all about the Rockefeller mafia sending their capo Kissinger, along with one of their own, Nelson Rockefeller, and the lackey Nixon as a front, over there in the 1970's to get the ball rolling. There is a quote in this book from David Rockefeller where he drools like a starving dog over the disposable and enslavable labor pool that exists in China that really says it all.

Another thing that most people don't know about is the Rockefellers control of the Standard Oil group which includes under their umbrella Exxon, Chevron, Phillips, Amoco, Marathon, BP and others. They also control major American banks like Chase Manhattan, and others. They founded the Trilateral Commision and (through Mandell House) the CFR. They set up fake "philantropist" foundations to fund organizations and causes that make them more money and further their globalist agenda as well as put up money for shills that feign opposition (Chomsky, Buchanan, Nader, Moore, various environmental groups, etc) but really subvert any real resistance to the new world order agenda. They and other uber capitalists even had a huge hand in funding the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and perpetrated the whole "cold war" hoax. I really could go on and on but I'll just leave you with those as a few examples. I mean forget about any "freemasons", "zionists", "jesuits" etc type of theories as to who is really pulling the strings. Just follow the money trail and you'll see that its the Rockefellers and a few other oligarchical families and cabals that are the top of the food chain in creating this sick destructive new world order that is a conspiracy against ALL people, cultures and races.

I had always been leery of Allen and his work because of his close association with the John Birch Society (I think its open to debate but a lot of evidence points in the direction of the JBS being a shill/controlled opposition organization) but this book helped bring a lot of things into focus for me as far as deciphering the globalist agenda/conspiracy so I have new found respect for the man. Gary Allen should be held in high regard along with Antony Sutton and Eustace Mullins as people who did the leg work that exposed much about the new world order conspiracy that other writers are selling books and riding the coattails of.


Ode to Gary Allen (1929-87), his best work, despite his wrongful slap at JFK
Gary Allen (see: Dave McCalden's Revisionist
Newsletters, 1981-1990) lost a leg to diabetes
in 1986 and died one year later. Too bad he
didn't find out how corrupt the John Birch So-
ciety (Masons in hierarchy) was before he died,
it hurt some views of his credibility. Nonethe-
less, aside from the books by the late Emanuel
Josephson (1910-1974), Allen did more research
into the criminal Rockefeller family than any-
body. And very good work, too. His cassette
tapes are still available from many Patriotic
co.s out there: Des Griffin, et, al. Highly
recommended, especially after the trash 'Pub-
lic TV exoneration of these weirdos! Other
Allen works are very good as well!

9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA, Fourth Edition by Webster Griffin Tarpley

Product Description

The thesis of Webster Tarpley's 911 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA has been enthusiastically received with its working model of the 9/11 plot: a covert network of moles, patsies, and a commando cell in the privatized intelligence services, backed by corrupt political and corporate media elites. Buttressed by historical examples like the Baader-Meinhof Gang and the Gunpowder Plot, this model makes it clear how such a monstrous false-flag or self-terror exploit is possible even under a largely benign government. That paradox is the incredibility gap that has made most Americans reject the evidence about 9/11 as paranoid fantasy. Tarpley brings decades of expertise to the 9/11 issue. In 1978 he exposed the terrorist Red Brigades as patsies of Italy's fascist P2 shadow government, and 9/11 is on the same pattern. The forthright subtitle, Made in USA, is backed up by an analysis of key figures who behave like moles working for the insidious network. 9/11 Synthetic Terror highlights the salient points of sheer physical impossibility of the official 9/11 conspiracy theory. It makes clear that figures like Osama bin Laden are patsies, dupes or double agents, selected for their ethnic coloring as the basis for launching a "Clash of Civilizations," and how absurd it is to imagine that such tools of US intelligence agencies could turn around and infiltrate or overwhelm US defenses unaided. Tarpley shows that the wars on the Islamic world, the Soviet-Afghan, Kosovo and Chechen conflicts, as well as US-UK-NATO synthetic terror incidents like 9/11, Beslan or 3/11 in Madrid, have been contrived to continue the Cold War, in pursuit of the centuries-long campaign for Anglo hegemony over Eurasia and the world. The preface to the second edition explains the significance and superiority of "MIHOP" vs "LIHOP," and the many drills on 9/11 and on 7/7, which were cover and conduit for those false-flag operations. The third edition preface makes clear that 9/11 is the only issue that can stop a new world war and the descent into a police state. It shows up the cowardice of the "left gatekeepers" on this score. The analysis of Moussaoui on trial as a classic weak-minded patsy -- part double agent, part fanatic -- again shows the unique power of Tarpley's mole-patsy model to debunk the lies put out by the war party. For a principled refutation of the 9/11 propaganda myth in all its parts, Tarpley'A bombshell, brilliant book - I strongly recommend 911 Synthetic Terror. Should be required reading for all honest truth seekers, s work is indispensable.
Product Details
Amazon Sales Rank: #27287 in Books
Published on: 2007-05-05
Number of items: 1
Binding: Paperback
512 pages
Editorial Reviews

Review
A bombshell, brilliant book - I strongly recommend 911 Synthetic Terror. Should be required reading for all honest truth seekers. --Judy Andreas, Rense.com, March 18, 2006

Can't stop reading; 9/11 Synthetic Terror is brilliantly written. Delivers a devastating judgment. Congratulations! I endorse it wholeheartedly. --Andreas von Buelow, Author of The CIA and 9/11.

September 11 was the true face of corporatized terror, said Tarpley on the "unanswered questions" of the socalled Official Story. --Mark Johnson, New York Magazine, March 27, 2006.

Review
Can't stop reading; 9/11 Synthetic Terror is brilliantly written. Delivers a devastating judgment. Congratulations! I endorse it wholeheartedly. --Andreas von Buelow, Author of The CIA and 9/11.

Review
September 11 was the true face of corporatized terror, said Tarpley on the "unanswered questions" of the socalled Official Story. --Mark Johnson, New York Magazine, March 27, 2006.
Customer Reviews

pathetic disinformation by an idiot or agent
I have personally contact the publisher and author (only the former replied) about a spurious quote taken from a NY Magazine article written on 9/11 conspiracy theories called "The Ground Zero Grassy Knoll". The fake book review is on the back cover of the third edition of Synthetic Terror. It reads "A Slam Dunk" -- New York Magazine. The deception is that the article's author wasn't endorsing the book but still Tarpley decided to mislead the public by taking the quote completely out of context to make it look like an endorsement of the book (and capitalized all three words), when in fact the article it was quoted from wasn't even a
book review! So how could the alleged "A Slam Dunk" review in bold letters on the back cover be real? Its not. Look up the NY Magazine article and read the whole thing. The alleged "A Slam Dunk" sentence that Tarpley "cites" as an endorsement is on the second page of the online version which can be found at nymag.com/news/features/16464/ .

Then go to the book store and compare the fake quote on the back of this book to what you read. Tarpley's disinformation just on the back cover alone should be enough to make you stay away from the book! Manufacturing a fake book review for your propaganda piece is beyond dishonest, and should make anyone with a critical mind question Tarpley's credibility (not to mention that the author is a former member of the criminal Lyndon LaRouche political cult). If you are unfortunate enough to purchase and read it, as I was, you'll find that Tarpley's book is filled with even more propaganda, misinformation, and disinformation on the inside, and makes this book a pathetic read, written by either an idiot or agent. I don't know which could be worse for the 9/11 truth movement.

America awaken from your ignorance!
Where do I begin, since I am not gifted with the power of flowery speech. This book, among many other related books, is trying to warn us about a terrible situation which has over taken us with unspeakble evil intentions. In fact it is so evil to suggest that manny are offended that we even dare to think this could happen: These naysayers are so deeply brainwashed they're beyond the touch of reality. This is exactly what the evil, scheming oligarchy is betting on that you won't believe any of this could be true. Some of you are crticial of this author's presentation of his information. So let me warn those below a certain level of IQ intelect that this is not an easy to read book. The author of this book already presumes you're up to date with certain facts of history and names and roles of various actors in this plot. Was WW1 & WWII true? Was Nagasaki and Hiroshima true? Was the Holocaust true? Was WMD of Iraq true? is the WMD of Syria true? All of the preceding representation of the evil, plotting elites consolidating their gold and power at the expense of our lives. And you still say no it can't be true? Your children's future is at stake here folks...keep sleeping at at the risk of your own demise.

The "Simon Cowell" of political critics
Webster Tarpley is the "Simon Cowell" of political critics: he minces no words, gets to the point, and tells it like it is. I loved the acerbic truth and the historical examples he used to prove his points. His views certainly dovetail all others on the subject and only reinforce their validity.

A Historical Dictionary of Psychiatry by Edward Shorter

Product Description

This is the first historical dictionary of psychiatry. It covers the subject from autism to Vienna, and includes the key concepts, individuals, places, and institutions that have shaped the evolution of psychiatry and the neurosciences. An introduction puts broad trends and international differences in context, and there is an extensive bibliography for further reading. Each entry gives the main dates, themes, and personalities involved in the unfolding of the topic. Longer entries describe the evolution of such subjects as depression, schizophrenia, and psychotherapy. The book gives ready reference to when things happened in psychiatry, how and where they happened, and who made the main contributions. In addition, it touches on such social themes as "women in psychiatry," "criminality and psychiatry," and "homosexuality and psychiatry." A comprehensive index makes immediately accessible subjects that do not appear in the alphabetical listing. Among those who will appreciate this dictionary are clinicians curious about the origins of concepts they use in their daily practices, such as "paranoia," "selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors" (SSRIs), or "tardive dyskinesia"; basic scientists who want ready reference to the development of such concepts as "neurotransmitters," "synapse," or "neuroimaging"; students of medical history keen to situate the psychiatric narrative within larger events, and the general public curious about illnesses that might affect them, their families and their communities-or readers who merely want to know about the grand chain of events from the asylum to Freud to Prozac. Bringing together information from the English, French, German, Italian, and Scandinavian languages, the Dictionary rests on an enormous base of primary sources that cover the growth of psychiatry through all of Western society.
Product Details

* Amazon Sales Rank: #761627 in Books
* Published on: 2005-02-17
* Number of items: 1
* Binding: Hardcover
* 352 pages

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...I highly recommend [this book] for all college, university, and public libraries." --Doody's
"...have done a remarkable job of compilation and made access to the knowledge they produced very easy. In its main aims the book is a genuine success and something genuinely new."--Lancet
"As a historian of psychiatry, Edward Shorter is well known for setting out his stall in full public view and bringing a great deal of factual detail and strong personal feelings to the task at hand."--he Lancet

About the Author
Edward Shorter is at University of Toronto.

Dirty Little Secrets of World War II: Military Information No One Told You... by James F. Dunnigan

Product Description

Dirty Little Secrets of World War II exposes the dark, irreverent, misunderstood, and often tragicomic aspects of military operations during World War II, many of them virtually unknown even to military buffs. Like its successful predecessor, Dirty Little Secrets, Dunnigan and Nofi's new book vividly brings to life all theaters and participants of the war. Revelations include:

- The real death count for the war, and why it has never been previously released.

- The "new age" general who refused to smoke or drink, who lived on a vitamin-enriched diet, who opposed animal experimentation, and who regularly consulted his astrologer.

- How equipment developed for the war led to such modern high-tech innovations as "smart bombs," electronic warfare, and nuclear missles.

- The lackadaisical relationship between Germany and Japan throughout the war.

- Tricky bits of information about the lingering effects of the war -- like the thousands of live shells and mines that are still buried in Europe and off the East Coast of America.
Product Details

* Amazon Sales Rank: #299284 in Books
* Published on: 1996-03-14
* Released on: 1996-03-14
* Number of items: 1
* Binding: Paperback
* 416 pages

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
There aren't many "dirty secrets" in this addictively readable book. Really, it's a compendium of fun facts about horrors arranged in bite-size prose bits and written under the influence of lead author Dunnigan's favorite book, Will Cuppy's irreverent historical classic The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody. The minichapters have titles like "Killer Vegetables and the Farts from Hell" (at 20,000 feet, gas caused by eating cabbages expanded, killing airmen). Did you know that every single German spy who infiltrated England became an Allied double agent? That MacArthur, Churchill, and Roosevelt all descended from one Sarah Belcher of Taunton, Massachusetts? That World War II killed about 100 million, or five percent of humanity? That a Russian was 100 times likelier to die than an American? (A USSR boy born in 1923 had an eighty-percent chance of dying by 1945.) We learn the origin of the term "rock & roll" (all weapons firing on automatic), the superiority or stupidity of tracer bullets, Göring's air-war policy, and U.S. troop-replacement policy. Some will argue with this book's rather simple answers to complex questions--was Chamberlain smart to cave to Hitler in the Munich pact because it bought a year to build planes and invent radar, which won the Battle of Britain? Other books come to different conclusions, but few so ably honor the master of snappy history, Will Cuppy. --Tim Appelo

From Publishers Weekly
This book is only partly about "dirty little secrets"; it is mostly a collection of unfamiliar information about the war, presented in some 300 briefs. Typical of the entries in these entertaining pages is a succinct account of the German "counterfeit offensive," in which an attempt was made to flood Britain with fake pound notes; and a comparison between American and German armies at squad, battalion and division level. In the intriguing trivia section, one learns that Gen. Douglas MacArthur was related to President Franklin Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and that participants in the battle for Guadalcanal included a 12-year-old American sailor. As to the dirty little secrets, here are a few examples: Australian stevedores deliberately obstructed the U.S. war effort at times; disease was responsible for nearly half the war deaths; Allied bombers caused far less damage to the enemy than is generally supposed. Dunnigan is the author of The Complete Wargames Handbook; Nofi wrote Napoleon at War. Illustrations.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Don't be misled by this book's title. There is nothing dirty or secret to be revealed here. Dunnigan (How To Make War, Morrow, 1983. rev. ed.) and Nofi, a former editor of Strategy and Tactics magazine, apply the same format of their earlier history of the Cold War (Dirty Little Secrets, Morrow, 1992) to World War II to produce a book containing about 300 infobytes of little-known or obscure facts about the war-everything from the venereal disease rates of the American forces to a description of the only ice cream-making ship in the U.S. Navy. The text is divided into eight broad sections, most devoted to the European theater of the war. One does not approach this book for specific information; just open it to any page and begin reading fascinating fact after fact. A comparable title is Karl Roebling's Great Myths of World War II (Paragon Pr., 1985). World War II is a hot topic among readers today, and this book would make an excellent addition to most public library collections.
Richard Nowicki, Emerson Vocational H.S., Buffalo
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Customer Reviews

Nothing "secret" in this book1
The title of this book can easily mislead folks into thinking that it contains little-known information about World War Two. It doesn't. I didn't find ONE bit of information I'd not already read about is real history books. Maybe the author(s) believe no one else knows about WW2, but the fact of the matter is that the book is nothing more than a collection of basic stories from the war that even the most casual student of the conflict is already aware of. Possibly a good book for a pure novice (who'd be better off with one of the Dummies or Idiots books), but this book is a waste of money for anyone who knows about the war.

It's no secret that this book isn't very good2
"Dirty Little Secrets of World War II" is a relatively recent (1990s) book that -- judging by its title -- should tell us something interesting that we don't know already about the war.

The trouble with this book is that its information isn't well-researched (the bibliography is a ghost town) and it isn't very well-written, either. Also, a lot of the purported "secrets" are no secret at all, and have been pretty well known facts for decades prior to this book's publication (i.e, the "secret" that Adolf Hitler was a non-smoking, teetotaling vegetarian with a tendency toward mysticism, or that, at the end, the Nazis used 15 year old Hitler Youth kids as soldiers).

Furthermore, what few "secrets" there are in this book often aren't very interesting.

Added to that, there are many instances in this book where the authors are just plain wrong, which is inexcusable considering that this book was written in the 1990s. For example, when discussing aviation fuel for RAF and Luftwaffe fighters during The Battle of Britain, the authors make the claim that the Hawker Hurricane was "the equal" of the Bf-109E, and that the Supermarine Spitfire was "superior," and that the RAF's better aviation fuel made the disparity that much greater.

WRONG. The Hurricane was recognized early as totally inferior to the Bf-109 barring turning circle and ruggedness by the RAF tacticians, who tried as far as possible to avoid letting the Hurricanes mix it with the Messerschmitts. This is a well-known fact backed by research, and not a random claim by men who didn't do their research. As to the Spitfire, independent Luftwaffe and RAF evaluations of captured aircraft more or less confirmed what everyone already knew -- and STILL knows -- that the Bf-109E and Spitfire Mks 1 and 2 were very closely matched, with neither being able to claim outright superiority. As far as the fuel situation, this is an interesting claim, but a claim is one thing -- backing it up is another, and the authors fail to do so. Sorry.

Later in the book, the authors claim that the AK-47 assault rifle was "modeled after" the German SG-44 of 1944.

WRONG. The outward appearance of both rifles delineate a superficial resemblance, yet the firing mechanisms of both rifles were different. A well known fact that the authors should have researched.

The authors make the claim that Operation Market Garden (Allied airborne operation over Holland in September 1944) landed "right on top of two crack SS panzer divisions."

Had these guys bothered to open a history book (either in English OR German), or even bothered to watch "A Bridge Too Far" they'd have found out that the two "crack divisions" mentioned in their book were not the elite, prepared divisions hinted at in the text, but rather shattered, depleted, severely understrength units recovering after a lengthy commitment on the Eastern Front.

The author make the claim that Soviet fighters' armament of "2 12.7 mm machine guns and a 20mm cannon" was light compared to the Bf-109.

... Whose standard armament was 2 13 mm machine guns and a 20 or 30 mm cannon, making the armaments relatively equal.


These are just a few out of many, many instances where the well-informed reader is left scratching his or her head.

Where are these guys getting this information?

They have their right to have an opinion, but they're stating things like they're researched facts, and they're not.

The authors also make frequent statements that make no sense. For example, they claim that the "crew of a B-17 and its personal equipment would weigh only 1 ton."

Okay, so let's estimate that all ten crewmen were on the light side at only 150lbs. Then factor in their oxygen, their heavy suits, their flak vests, and other sundries.

Comes to a lot more than 2000 lbs.

Also, the book is written in this irreverent, smart-alecky tone that may jar with some readers, because it isn't clever or witty and the repeated, obvious attempts at levity are really annoying.

The book gives the impression that it will be a serious, scholarly volume that can take its rightful place alongside other respected works, but it just goes to show us the old aphorism holds true -- you can't judge a book by -- well, you know the rest.

Unfortunately, the authors don't seem to.


Skip it.

More trivia than secrets3
This book is best suited for the history buff, as it contains pages (and pages, and pages, and pages) of world war 2 trivia. Unfortunately, the so called "Dirty Little Secrets" are few and far between. The lay reader will lose interest as the signal-to-noise ratio for the non-afficianado is just too low.

Madness: A Brief History by Roy Porter

Product Description

Looking back on his confinement to Bethlem, Restoration playwright Nathaniel Lee declared: "They called me mad, and I called them mad, and damn them, they outvoted me." As Roy Porter shows in Madness: A Brief History, thinking about who qualifies as insane, what causes mental illness, and how such illness should be treated has varied wildly throughout recorded history, sometimes veering dangerously close to the arbitrariness Lee describes and often encompassing cures considerably worse than the illness itself.
Drawing upon eyewitness accounts of doctors, writers, artists, and the mad themselves, Roy Porter tells the story of our changing notions of insanity and of the treatments for mental illness that have been employed from antiquity to the present day. Beginning with 5,000-year-old skulls with tiny holes bored in them (to allow demons to escape), through conceptions of madness as an acute phase in the trial of souls, as an imbalance of "the humors," as the "divine fury" of creative genius, or as the malfunctioning of brain chemistry, Porter shows the many ways madness has been perceived and misperceived in every historical period. He takes us on a fascinating round of treatments, ranging from exorcism and therapeutic terror--including immersion in a tub of eels--to the first asylums, shock therapy, the birth of psychoanalysis, and the current use of psychotropic drugs.
Throughout, Madness: A Brief History offers a balanced view, showing both the humane attempts to help the insane as well as the ridiculous and often cruel misunderstanding that have bedeviled our efforts to heal the mind of its myriad afflictions.
Product Details

* Amazon Sales Rank: #206324 in Books
* Published on: 2003-05-08
* Number of items: 1
* Binding: Paperback
* 256 pages

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal
No branch of medicine faces as much popular skepticism as psychiatry. In this readable yet rigorous little book with a global slant, Porter (social history of medicine, University Coll., London; The Greatest Benefit to Mankind) addresses that controversy by recounting the history of mental illness from antiquity to modern times. A wealth of facts and literary references illuminate how people went from believing that supernatural forces cause mental illness to their reliance on more rational and naturalistic explanations, culminating in today's combination of the medical and psychosocial models. Porter also discusses topical issues, including the relationship between lunacy and creativity; the drive to institutionalize, which peaked in the mid-20th century; the rise and demise of psychoanalysis; and the development of the antipsychiatry movement. This book combines the appeal of history as narrative with the intellectual stimulation derived from cogent analysis. Less comprehensive than Edward Shorter's A History of Psychiatry: From the Era of the Asylum to the Age of Prozac but more academic than Alex Beam's Gracefully Insane: The Rise and Fall of America's Premier Mental Hospital, it will engage both general readers and psychiatry students with its sparkling prose and a well-annotated bibliography. Highly recommended. Antoinette Brinkman, M.L.S., Evansville, IN
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Medical historian Porter authoritatively traces how Western culture has explained and treated insanity. Holes bored in 7,000-year-old skulls indicate the earliest assessment of madness as spirit-possession. The ancient Greeks and medieval and Renaissance philosophers influenced by them replaced possession with irrationality as the cause of madness and exorcists with physicians as its curers. The Enlightenment stressed folly as the mark of madness; romanticism reacted by considering genius akin to madness. Asylums arose to secure the insane for their own good, and newly emergent psychiatry developed several ostensibly successful asylum strategies. As asylums became overloaded with incurables, however, disillusionment induced underfunding. Freud and his spawn came to psychiatry's rescue, but madness persists despite a century of psychoanalysis and of listening increasingly to what the insane say about their conditions. New drugs quash symptoms but have undesirable side effects, including dependency. Meanwhile, the medical profession is divided about the legitimacy of psychiatry. An ideal introduction to its subject, and a timely supplement to Robert Whitaker's superb Mad in America [BKL D 15 01]. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"A brief and fascinating history of insanity."--Susan Salter Reynolds, Los Angeles Times Book Review
"In just over 200 pages Porter manages to cram in everything from 7,000-year-old skulls with holes bored into them to release demons to the rise of psychopharmacology. In between we get Greco-Roman rationalism, the bloody and persistent belief that mental illness was caused by a compromised faith in God (approximately 200,000 witches killed), the rebirth of the humors (blood, choler, melancholy, and--my favorite--phlegm), institutionalization, Freudian analysis, de-institutionalization, the death of Freudian analysis (to your computers, Cambridge analysts!), and the glorification of insanity under Michel Foucault. It's a rich history, and because of Porter's delightful habit of bringing in colorful figures to fill out the story, his book seems bright even when walking the dingy halls of Bedlam."--Sunday Boston Globe
"The sudden and unexpected death of Roy Porter in March robbed the English-speaking world of one of its most prolific, colorful and talented social historians.... Madness...displays several of his virtues: his wide reading, his prodigious memory, his extraordinary capacity for synthesis, his eye for an anecdote, and the sheer fun he took in telling a story."--Nature
"A magisterial synthesis of 1,000 years of mental illness and psychiatric remedies. The book wears its learning so lightly that in an afternoon's perusal, the average reader has a genuinely informed account of what all the shouting has been about."--Toronto Globe and Mail
"This small book is rich in detail yet never loses sight of the broader ebb and flow in society's beliefs about what constitutes mental illness."--Houston Chronicle
Customer Reviews

Madness in Social Context4
Ror Porter's excellent book places the history of madness within specific social contexts. We get a full picture of the perception of madness primarily as an emblem of difference which serves as a trigger for rejection by the dominant social forces of communities. Individuals outside the dominant social groups are confined, placed in asylums, and made invisible; Porter reveals to us that the "mad" weren't necessarily ill or disordered, but often individuals that were seen as a blight on the facade of cities---single women, orphaned children, the disabled, or artists whose freedom was considered a threat to more conservative rulers of town and country. Porter's description of madness as illness is equally compelling. He writes with elegance, style, and clarity. Highly recommended.

Madness... Such Beauty!4
This book was like nothing I have ever read before. The detail that was shown throughout the book really was able to make me see what it might have looked like, sounded like, felt like and sometimes even smelled like being in an asylum. The amount of information that Roy Porter put into this book was amazing. You might have thought he haad been in an asylum himself. I would absolutely recommend this book to anyone.

Roy Porter's succinct historical summary of madness4
This is the first book I have ever read by Roy Porter,
but it won't be the last. He is a polished writer and
in this condensed overview of the history of mental
illness, every word is measured and to the point.

I love the illustrations and do wish the book came
in a larger format.

One grave omission, imho, there is not mention of
lithium as one of the great drugs of the century.

Squiggles