In the Shadow of Fame: A Memoir by the Daughter of Erik H. Erikson

by Sue Erikson Bloland

Book Overview

As the daughter of the renowned psychoanalyst Erik H. Erikson, Sue Erikson Bloland has struggled to reconcile the public view of her father as a pioneering intellectual with the complex and rather insecure man whom she knew in private. In a portrait enriched by her own psychoanalytic training, Bloland describes her family both before and after the advent of Erikson’s renown and explores the ramifications of the pursuit of fame. In this beautifully...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0143036467
• ISBN13: 9780143036463
• Release Date: January 2006
• Publisher: Penguin Group
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.1" x 7.7"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Chosen by the gods

The author's father became famous when she was thirteen. He was a cultural icon. What affected Sue Bloland Erikson was the intensity of people's reactions to Erikson's writings. Media generated stories are like fairy tales. Her father's celebrity diminished the author in her own eyes since her father's fame didn't capture his complexity. In the author's early childhood the family acquired a taboo subject, a handicapped child institutionalized at birth. The three children in the family were told that the baby had died. The emotional fragility of her parents was sensed by the author very early. She traces the causes to their own childhood experiences. The name Erikson was an invention. (Both parents seemed self-invented.) Through Peter Blos, a friend, Erikson moved to Vienna in his middle twenties to teach at a school founded by Dorothy Burlingame. He met both Anna and Sigmund Freud at the time. Their recognition of his gifts changed his life forever. (Later Anna Freud perceived Erikson's work as a betrayal of Freudian theory.) Marriage provided Erikson with physical, emotional, and intellectual support. The tension in the marital relationship turned on Erik Erikson's feelings of personal inadequacy and Joan Erikson's feelings of personal deprivation. The couple adopted a means of coping by emotional avoidance. Public adoration after CHILDHOOD AND SOCIETY was issued gave Erik Erikson new confidence in his intellectual abilities. As a young adult the author was plagued by feelings of inadequacy, (she didn't feel that she had been chosen by the gods). Early influence had given the author the language of analysis. She began to understand this when she sought therapeutic treatment for herself. By the mid 1970's Erikson's reputation was being seriously challenged. When her son Per went to college, the author decided to become an analyst. She had to fight her insecurity and her reluctance to exercise authority. The book has clarity and thoughtfulness. Its narrative encompasses Sue Erikson Bloland's parents' fame and her reaction to it.

Powerful, uncompromising, tender.

The fine balance of the writing is the first thing that impresses. The author is not into throwing stones and appears to have precisely caught the mid-point between unsentimental description and emotional reality. One cannot emerge unsympathetic either to her or her subjects. Then she decribes quite fairly the great irony of how one of modern history's most influential thinkers fell victim to forces that he himself so accurately described. It was Erikson after all who, in his study of Ghandi, described charismatic leaders as attempting to solve for others some problem they have been unable to solve for themselves. Lastly there is the dark warning implicit in the book: none of us are safe, for none of us can tell what decisions made long ago, perhaps in crisis or even calmly and rationally, with the very best of intentions, may return with disastrous unintended consequences to ruin our lives. The best book I've read in five years.

Fame and the family

This very moving and fascinating book is a must read on several different levels. On one level, Sue Bloland is addressing an issue we are all so familiar with - fame and the human fascination with either achieving it or connecting with someone who has achieved it. Certainly, as she explains so simply and clearly, it is very human to idealize, envy and project many of our own fantasies (and power)onto the most successful people in whatever field they excel. As an analyst, the story she tells about her life with her father, Erik Erikson, expands and illuminates why some people are driven relentlessly to seek fame; what many issues the famous struggle with internally and silently, and what it is like to be the child in their shadow. She succeeds without jargon or over-intellectualizing in bringing to light the complexities of all these issues and in inspiring compassion for both the admired and the admiring. On another level, she weaves a fascinating and very colorful tapestry that brings together her parents' histories and experiences, showing us what helped to create the very talented, charismatic and insecure people they were. In the process, we can all identify as we see so clearly the impact of past generations on who we become. These descriptions clarify so beautifully how nature and nurture shape us and our destinies. Thus, in describing her own childhood experiences in the light of her parents very complicated and often fascinating stories she takes us all far beyond anger or blame and leaves us feeling much compassion for everyone involved. This, I feel is the amazing gift tht she has given us in this poignant and beautiful book

Great reading for those with or without famous parents

This is a beautifully written and insightful memoir about the author's experience as the daughter of the famous psychoanalyst Erik H. Erikson. Bloland's personal struggle resonated deeply with me, even though I have no familial connection with fame. She writes so candidly about her most painful (as well as her most affirming) experiences growing up that the reader is able to identify with her on many different levels. One of the most compelling books I've read in a long time.

Liberating Fame's Captives

Using her own personal history as well as other historic sources, Sue Erikson Bloland documents the phenomenon of "fame" and its origins. Ms. Bloland has described not only her particular situation but the dilema of a generation. At some point in the 20th century, the cult of the individual eclipsed the cult of the collective (religion) and our immersion, both conscious and unconscious, in its web continues to shape our contemporary cultural landscape. This book is aptly packaged as a personal memoir yet Bloland sets the stage for further research as to why fame has become a defining social goal. Her focus is the damage rendered not only to those intimately connected to fame's fall-out but also to a society that diminishes itself as it elevates individuals to super-human status. At the end, Ms. Boland reconciles herself to her family (and heritage) and encourages us to re-examine our own need to worship other mortals. "In the Shadow of Fame" has brilliantly set the groundwork for liberating ourselves from the "cult of the individual" and gently encourages us to humanize the heroes we worship.