Anthony Storr (18 May 1920 – 17 March 2001) was an English psychiatrist, psychoanalyst and author.
The human spirit is not indestructible; but a courageous few discover that, when in hell, they are granted a glimpse of heaven.
The sane are madder than we think, the mad saner.
I get intrigued by a puzzle, and writing a book is the best way to solve it.
Had [Winston Churchill] been a stable and equable man, he could never have inspired the nation. In 1940, when all the odds were against Britain, a leader of sober judgment might well have concluded that we were finished.
Inspiration cannot be willed, though it can be wooed.
If creative work protects a man against mental illness, it is small wonder that he pursues it with avidity; and even if the state of mind he is seeking to avoid is no more than a mild state of depression or apathy, this still constitutes a cogent reason for engaging in creative work even when it brings no obvious external benefit in its train.
In a culture in which interpersonal relationships are generally considered to provide the answer to every form of distress, it is sometimes difficult to persuade well-meaning helpers that solitude can be as therapeutic as emotional support.
Avoidance behavior is a response designed to protect the infant from behavioral disorganization. If we transfer this concept to adult life, we can see that an avoidant infant might very well develop into a person whose principal need was to find some kind of meaning and order in life which was not entirely, or even chiefly, dependent upon interpersonal relationships
It is a tragic paradox that the very qualities that have led to man's extraordinary capacity for success are also those most likely to destroy him.
What chiefly concerns and alarms many of us are the problems arising from religious fanaticism. As long as large numbers of militant enthusiasts are persuaded that they alone have access to the truth, and that the rest of us are infidels, we remain under threat. Lord Acton's famous phrase about power can be used of another danger. Dogma tends to corrupt, and absolute dogma corrupts absolutely.
The word "jealousy" is often used as if it were synonymous with envy; but I think the distinction worth preserving. Jealousy is predominantly concerned with the fear of loss of something one possesses, envy with the wish to own something another possesses. Othello suffers from the fear that he has lost Desdemona's love. Iago suffers from envy of the position held by Cassio, to which he feels entitled.
All the world loves a lover, and a lover loves all the world.
One man's faith is another man's delusion
Idiosyncratic belief systems which are shared by only a few adherents are likely to be regarded as delusional. Belief systems which may be just as irrational but which are shared by millions are called world religions.
If we did not look to marriage as the principal source of happiness, fewer marriages would end in tears.
Whether a belief is considered to be a delusion or not depends partly upon the intensity with which it is defended, and partly upon the numbers of people subscribing to it.
I want to show that the dividing lines between sanity and mental illness have been drawn in the wrong place.
Imagination flourishes best in solitude.
The creative consequences of man's imaginative strivings may never make him whole; but they constitute his deepest consolations and his greatest glories.
The creative person is constantly seeking to discover himself, to remodel his own identity, and to find meaning in what he creates.