PERIPHERALIA

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Over the years I have lent books to patients to read in 
order for them to understand more about what they are 
experiencing with their illnesses. I tell them that if they do 
not return the books, I will hunt them down and kill them, 
but I notice, despite my threats, that my library has quite a 
few gaps on the selves. I can never remember to whom I have 
lent them and I usually lose the slip of paper on which I have 
written their name and the book title. 

First I try and assess whether the patient is a “reader” and is 
suitable for the task. In the book The Little Paris Bookshop, the 
main protagonist is Mr Perdu who is a bookseller and whose 
bookshop is called The Literary Apothecary.  He assesses his 
customers’ character and will not sell a book to clients, if he 
does not think it will be suitable for them.  If clients choose 
something unsuitable, he advises them to choose something 
else that he usually recommends to them.

Interestingly, my most lent books are three books by the 
same author, the Oxford and Princeton academic, A Alvarez, 
who attempted suicide after his first marriage ended. 
The first book is called The Savage God in which he writes 
with extraordinary power about depression from both a 
personal and literary point of view. The second is called  
Life After Divorce and, in a similar vein, draws on literature 
and conversations with many divorced people to present 
a compassionate account of the experience. His third book 
is called The Biggest Game in Town and is for the very few 
patients that one finds suffering from that most secretive of 
obsessions, compulsive gambling.

My back-up for patients after a divorce is a chapter in the 
book Trust Me by the American novelist, John Updike, and is 
called Death of Distant Friends. Another helpful book by John 
Updike is called Self-Consciousness and is where he describes 
his life-long struggle with psoriasis in the chapter called “At 
War with My Skin”.

Another enigmatic illness, anorexia nervosa, is well described 
by Jenefer Shute from the perspective of the patient and is 
an essay called “Life Size”. These texts and many others may 
help the isolation that some patients feel when faced with 
illnesses that are difficult to understand and allow them 
some consolation and support from fellow sufferers.

“Books are more than doctors,” says Mr Perdu. “Some novels 
are loving, lifelong companions; some give you a clip around 
the ear, while others are friends who wrap you in warm 
towels when you’ve got those autumn blues”.

So I need to know the patient reasonably well as book-
lending is not a first consultation affair. There are now 

thousands upon thousands of self-help books available on 
every conceivable illness and malady known to man. I find 
that by reading the preface of most of them you have read all 
the ideas or advice that is in the book and it usually repeats 
the same stuff about diet, exercise, sleep and vitamins. 

There is also a huge variety of religious literature available, 
but here one has to be careful not to impose one’s own likes 
and beliefs on the patient and some judgment is needed in 
this respect.

With family members living with people with personality 
disorders, I sometimes lend Stop Walking on Eggshells by 
Mason and Kreger, and for adult patients with ADHD there 
is The Edison Gene by Thom Hartmann who proposes that 
ADHD sufferers are hunters living in a farmer’s world.

I have also (and you are not allowed to mention this to 
anyone)  The Australian Cannabis Cook Book by Sinton and 
MacCullum, which may be useful for, amongst others, 
chronic pain syndromes. It has excellent recipes for chicken 
corn and cannabis soup, as well as ganja stir-fry and spaced-
out muffins.

For your middle life crisis there is The Middle Passage by the 
Jungian psychologist James Hollis, which deals with the 
questioning and psychological turmoil during the male and 
female menopause.

“It is a common misconception,” reflected Mr Perdu, “that 
booksellers look after books. They look after people. I wanted 
to treat feelings that are not recognized as afflictions and 
are never diagnosed by doctors … feelings and emotions 
no therapist is interested in, because they are apparently 
too minor and intangible: the feeling that washes over you 
when another summer nears its end; or when you recognize 
that you haven’t got your whole life left to find out where 
you belong; or the slight sense of grief when a friendship 
doesn’t develop as you thought, and you have to continue 
your search for a lifelong companion. Things like that.” 

Chris Ellis is a family physician in Pietermaritzburg, 
KwaZulu-Natal

E mail: cristobalellis@gmail.com

ADDENDUM:  Readers might like to write to the editor to 
suggest books that they find useful for themselves or for their 
patients. Go to www.safpj.co.za then to new submissions 
then to Letters to the Editor.

Books as therapy