This book represents the first comprehensive critical study in English of Ludwig Binswanger's life's work. Included are a section on how Binswanger creatively fused the philosophies of Martin Heidegger and Martin Buber to suit his own clinical aims, two chapters on his classic case history, the case of Ellen West, and a discussion of Binswanger's concept of "extravagance," with an example from a British case history.

Binswanger was a seminal figure in the later developments of R. D. Laing's "antipsychiatry" and Gilles Deleuze's "schizoanalysis" that attained popularity throughout the 1970s. In light of the recent ideological backtraking of R. D. Laing in his recent book "The Voice of Experience," this look at the founder and pioneer of existential psychiatry is especially timely and pertinent.

This book will be of great value to the more advanced reader, as well as the student approaching the world of existential psychiatry for the first time.