The Beast in the Nursery: On Curiosity and Other Appetites

by Adam Phillips

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"Growing up is a process of disillusionment, during which we shed the vitality of childhood - or so conventional wisdom has it. In The Beast in the Nursery, Adam Phillips shows why we are so keen to accept this reassuringly disappointing myth. He questions whether our first appetites can survive the acquisition of language, the donning of custom, the onset of education - all the ways in which we learn that the world is not simply what we want it to be. He offers a portrait of the conflict in show more all of us between the child and the realist, the dreamer and the scientist, the beast and the nursery. For Phillips, our lives are livable only insofar as we do not lose what inspires us, but learn instead how to transform it into guiding knowledge."--BOOK JACKET. show less

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3 reviews
More Phillips with such interesting ideas. Off to another one of his for me!
A must-read for anyone interested in the ever-evolving quest to understand life.
Librería 4. Estante 3.

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32+ Works 3,373 Members
Adam Phillips is the author of six previous books, including "The Beast in the Nursery" & "Monogamy" (both available form Vintage). Formerly the principal child psychotherapist at Charing Cross Hospital in London, he lives in England. (Bowker Author Biography)

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First words
When H.G. Wells accused Henry James in a letter of having sacrificed his life to art, James replied, with characteristically artful indignation: 'I live, live intensely, and am fed by life, and my value, whatever it might be... (show all) is my own kind of expression of that. Art makes life, makes interest, makes importance.'

Classifications

Genres
Nonfiction, General Nonfiction
DDC/MDS
150.195Philosophy & psychologyPsychologyEmotions, Relationships, & FamilyTheory And InstructionSystems, schools, viewpointsPsychoanalytic systems
LCC
BF173 .P568Philosophy, Psychology and ReligionPsychologyPsychologyPsychoanalysis
BISAC

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134
Popularity
243,174
Reviews
3
Rating
(3.94)
Languages
English, Spanish
Media
Paper, Ebook
ISBNs
6
ASINs
1