Narrative and Psychotherapy

`A densely packed book with interesting and valuable research gleaned from a wide variety of therapy approaches, Narrative and Psychotherapy furnishes the reader with a cogent historical appraisal of the way psychotherapy, culture and storytelling fit together.... A good reference book for counsellors and students.... The authors′ students, and clients, must be very happy that he has the interest and the capacity to tune in to others in such a fresh manner′ - Counselling, The Journal of the British Association for Counselling

The core of psychotherapy can be seen as a process in which the client comes to tell, and then re-author, an individual life-story or personal narrative. The author of this book argues that all therapies are, therefore, narrative therapies, and that the counselling experience can be understood in terms of telling and retelling stories. If the story is not heard, then the therapist and the client are deprived of the most effective and mutually involving mode of discourse open to them.

Taking a narrative approach also requires thinking about the nature of truth, the concept of the person, the relationship between therapist and client, and the knowledge base of psychotherapy. John McLeod examines the role and significance of stories in psychotherapy from within a broad-based cultural and theoretical framework.