Recommended Reading:

(Contributed by Brian Kaplan)

1. GULLIVER'S TRAVELS, Jonathan Swift
I've always found it strange that many people think of this as a book for children, with the enduring memory of a man being tied down by tiny people. Actually this is one of the great satirical novels of all time and anything but a kid's book. Swift's narrative is radiantly laconic and his attacks on the hypocrisy of his time (and all time) are both merciless and hysterically funny. One of the great masterpieces of the English language; any aspiring Provocative Therapist who has not read it from cover to cover deserves to be thrown to the Yahoos. (and now some of you have learned where that word comes from!)

2. CATCH 22,  Joseph Heller
The phrase has deservedly worked its way into the language. The anti-hero, Yossarian's predicament, is both tragic and very funny but Heller also manages to suspend the reader's disbelief and develop a whole range of  hilarious characters. The whole tone of the book is excellent medicine for Provocative Therapists. Essential reading.

3. HOW TO BE GOD, George Mikes
Difficult to get hold of, but worth the effort. The title itself suggests the book as essential reading for us and the content does not disappoint. God has always been an excellent ally to all Provocative Therapists - literally.

4. THE BIBLE and THE COMPLETE WORKS OF SHAKESPEARE.
Obviously, I am not going to write 'reviews' except to say that the founder of Provocative Therapy, Frank Farrelly, quotes liberally from both of these when working with clients. "He jests at scars that never felt a wound" (Romeo and Juliet) is something I use frequently to describe myself in practice!

5. OSCAR WILDE, Richard Ellman
This biography is absolutely brilliant. The Complete Works is available for a pittance and there are many books of quotes by the great man. And of course almost everything he wrote is great stuff for us, except De Profundis (which has merit but is not that useful for Provocative Therapists).
His plays are also well worth catching on stage as the dialogue is full of wonderful ripostes and ironic remarks that are the very essence of the conversations we have while doing PT. Wilde was a Provocative Therapist for the whole of English-speaking society. So in gratitude they disgraced him, threw him into jail and more or less forced him into exile where he changed his name and died a broken  man in his mid-40s.
"Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about it" (Lady Windermere's Fan).     EXACTLY!!

6. PORTNOY'S COMPLAINT: Philip Roth.
Roth made his name as a great novelist with this very funny book about coming of age as a Jewish boy in New Jersey. It is bitingly funny about everything but especially about sex, America and the joys and sorrows of being Jewish. Personally I think Roth has since matured as an author with books about his alter ego, Nathan Zuckerman. The Anatomy Lesson and The Counterlife are wonderful but Portnoy's Complaint is the book for which he will be remembered. Roth has long deserved the Nobel Prize for literature and won just about every other award going. Don't die before you have read a Philip Roth novel!

7. DIARIES: Alan Clark.
Alan Clark (1928-1999) was an extraordinary British politician whose like we may never see again. He may have been the best Minister of Defence, Britain never had but probably excluded himself from this possibility by his courageous and brilliant book The Donkeys which is highly critical of inane military decisions that sent tens of thousands to their deaths in WWI. (The lions being the British soldiers of the First World War. The donkeys were their generals.)
However it is for these extraordinary diaries (3 volumes covering the years 1972 to 1999) that he will be remembered. Appropriately indiscreet, honest and totally provocative, these diaries show British politics from the inside. More than that they show the working of a remarkable man. Clark was an aristocrat, wealthy, lived in a castle, collected expensive cars, and was totally ambitious. His life was full of wonderful paradoxes. A committed philanderer, he remained totally in love with his wife and committed to his family. A rightwinger, he admired the comedic left-wing parliamentarian Dennis Skinner. Always adoring of Margaret Thatcher (The Lady in the diaries) he makes delicious fun of most of his Tory colleagues. Parliament, Britain and politics in general get full-on satiric treatment here. A must for provocative therapists in the UK and much to amuse anybody, anywhere.

(more recommended fiction to come as well as recommended non-fiction)

Recommended Film Feature Viewing for Provocative Therapists:

Movies are a matter of taste but some films are more provocative than others. Here are some films that incorporate some of the spirit of Provocative Therapy:

1. DUCK SOUP.  (Leo McCarey, 1933)
Fans of the Marx brothers have different favourites for different reasons but it's usually this one and A Night at the Opera that come out on top. Although Animal Crackers and Monkey Business are also great, this one takes the prize for me as it is just pure anarchy, surrealism and a cascade of ruthless attacks on pomposity and hypocrisy. With Groucho at his best, acting and singing, this film is full of sublime moments. At another level, it is profoundly political and anti-war. For this reason I recommend that it be viewed regularly by the United Nations security council.

2. AS GOOD AS IT GETS (James L. Brooks 1997)
This is Jack Nicholson's best film since Chinatown and certainly his funniest. The producers of this film deserve an award for sheer inventiveness. With 'Political Correctness' sanitizing some of the zaniest stuff around (look what they did to poor Benny Hill, one of the funniest clowns ever in England) the makers of this film did something very clever indeed. They gave the anti-hero of the film, Jack Nicholson, a psychiatric illness called Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). This ploy gives Jack Nicholson the chance to make the most outrageously insulting comments to all and sundry without actually taking responsibility for them because he is 'mentally ill' (wink-wink, nudge-nudge).
This film deserves repeated viewing. Nicholson's remarks can be a bit sadistic but if you can talk like he does in this film but with 'affection in your heart and a twinkle in your eye', you are well on the way to becoming an effective Provocative Therapist.

3. THE SUNSHINE BOYS (Herbert Ross, 1975)
Great rhetoric and with Walter Matth-au and George Burns at their very best. Do I need to say more?

4. WITHNAIL AND I (Bruce Robinson, 1987)
Admittedly this is a very English film with some of my American friends not getting it at all. But it is a great English movie. Richard E. Grant is brilliant as the ever-so-talented but bitter, frustrated and out-of-work actor. Like Nicholson he is given some wonderfully provocative lines - this time without any excuse at all.

5. FASTER, PUSSYCAT! KILL! KILL! (Russ Meyer 1965)
Russ Meyer is probably the most misunderstood and underrated director in the history of American film. In UK video shops his films are in the 'soft porn' section which is an absolute insult to the artistic integrity of the man. Yes, his heroines do tend to have large mammary glands but he chooses feisty, powerful actresses with big breasts for a very good reason. His comic heroines are confident, powerful women who demand satisfaction in their lives but are horribly and comically let down by weak men at all levels. In other words they are the exact opposite of the popular (but arguably chauvinistic) female stereotype portrayed in most American movies.
Most of Meyer's films (the exception being Beyond  the Valley of the Dolls) were made on a tiny budget and therefore can be regarded as the very best of B-grade movies. For some this one is his best but his films comprise a genre of their own. Once you get the central joke, you can't stop laughing…..

6. THE LIFE OF BRIAN (Terry Jones, 1979)
The Monty Python team are at their best in this hilarious story of a man called Brian, who is mistaken for the Messiah throughout his life. At one point he urges the 'followers' that plague his life to realize that they are all individuals. To which the huge crowd responds in unison:
"We are all individuals!"  Simply wonderful.

7. THE SIMPSONS: (on TV worldwide)
This is both my own favourite television programme and that of my five year -old son. Call me puerile but I think The Simpsons are sublime and a marvellous way to keep up with what is happening in the USA. I don’t know how many comedians and scriptwriters work behind the scenes for this programme but our congratulations to them all. Homer Simpson may soon become more famous than Mickey Mouse – and deservedly so! In a memorable episode he makes a rare assertive pitch for a job. Surprised and overjoyed at becoming employed, he dances around the room: “I’ve got a job. I’ve got a job! Only in America could someone like me get a job!”
Wondrous stuff.

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