Drama and Healing: The Roots of Drama Therapy

Roger Grainger shows how drama therapy itself is an effective treatment for depression and schizophrenia, having a measurable effect on thought disorder. He looks at the specific relationship between rational thought and artistic experience which allows the second to act as the mediator of the first. The book is in two parts, and examines the therapeutic origins of theatre and the part played by drama in psychological development. Also, the drama therapy experience is discussed, drawing material from case studies to show how drama therapy is used with people diagnozed as schizophrenic or as depressed. The ways the therapy is set up, the people involved, actual sessions and the measurable results displays the connection between drama therapy and ritual, a connection to which the author suggests, it owes its healing power.