Uncovering Lives

Psychobiography is often attacked by critics who feel that it trivialises complex adult personalities, "explaining the large deeds of great individuals," as George Will wrote, "by some slight the individual suffered at a tender age, say seven, when his mother took away a lollipop." And yet, as Alan Elms argues in Uncovering Lives, in the hands of a skilled practitioner, psychobiography can rival the very best traditional biography in the insights it offers.

Elms makes a strong case for the value of psychobiography, arguing in large part from his own fascinating case studies of over a dozen prominent figures, including George Bush, Saddam Hussein, and Sigmund Freud.

Written with great clarity and wit, Uncovering Lives illuminates the contributions that psychology can make to biography. Elm's enthusiasm for his subject is contagious and will inspire would-be psychobiographers as well as win over the most hardened skeptics.