Portraits of the artist : psychoanalysis of creativity and its vicissitudes.

Introduction by Peter Gay.

'With the same spirit of adventure that characterized Freud's investigation of the unconscious, Dr. Gedo applies the methods of contemporary depth psychology to the fascinating and, until now, relatively uncharted terrain of creativity--an area that Freud himself declined to enter. Unlike other attempts to explore the psychology of creativity, which have been largely limited to the domain of psychobiography and beset by the familiar problems of scarce primary resources and conflicting data, Gedo's account incorporates first-hand clinical material drawn from his extensive therapeutic encounters with a wide range of creative individuals... Insights gleaned from those clinical encounters are then applied to an understanding of productivity of such renowned painters as van Gogh, Picasso, Gauguin, and Caravaggio, and writers such as Nietzsche, Jung, and Freud.'

Hardcover