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.

John McLeod is Professor of Counselling at the University of Abertay Dundee, Scotland, and previous Professor of Counselling Studies at Keele University, England. Originally trained in person-centered counseling and psychotherapy, he has shifted in recent years in the direction of a narrative-informed approach. Research interests include the development of qualitative methods for the hermeneutic narrative analysis of interview and psychotherapy transcript data, and the creation of practitioner-oriented research strategies. He has published six books, including An Introduction to Counselling, Second Edition (Open University Press 1998), which incorporates a chapter on narrative approaches, Narrative & Psychotherapy (Sage Ltd, 1997), which reviews recent developments in narrative-informed theory, research and practice, and Qualitative Research in Counselling & Psychotherapy (Sage Ltd, 2000), which includes a chapter on research into narrative and discourse in psychotherapy. He has also published over 30 chapters and papers on a range of counseling and psychotherapy topics.

In addition to their academic work, both Angus and McLeod are practicing clinicians who see clients, train and supervise clinical psychologists in psychotherapy and counseling skills and are engaged in psychotherapy process and outcome research. In their work, they attempt to fully integrate theory and research into practice, and they believe that each component of the process-practice, theory, evaluation/research-inform each other.