On Balance

“Balancing acts,” writes Adam Phillips, “are entertaining because they are risky, but there are situations in which it is more dangerous to keep your balance than to lose it.” In these exhilarating and casually brilliant essays, the philosopher and psychoanalyst examines literature, fairy tales, works of art, and case studies to reveal the paradoxes inherent in our appetites and fears. How do we know when enough is enough? Are there times when too much is just right? Why is Cinderella’s biggest problem not the prince but other women? What can Richard III’s furious sense of his own helplessness tell us of our own desires? On Balance shows Phillips’s bravura gift for linking disparate ideas and the dreamers that dreamed them into something beautiful, revelatory, and essential.

Adam Phillips is a psycho-analyst and a visiting professor in the English department at the University of York. He is the author of many acclaimed books, including On Kissing, Tickling, and Being Bored; Going Sane; and On Kindness (with Barbara Taylor). He lives in London.