Elliott Smith was one of the most gifted songwriters of the nineties, adored by worshipful fans for his subtly melancholic words and melodies. The sadness had its sources in the life. There was trauma from an early age, years of drug abuse and a chronic sense of disconnection that sometimes seemed almost self-engineered. Smith died violently in Los Angeles in 2003, under what some believe to be questionable circumstances, of a single fatal stab wound to the chest. By this time fame had found him, and record buyers who shared the listening experience felt he spoke directly to them from beyond: lonely, lovelorn, frustrated, fighting until he could fight no more. And yet, although his achingly intimate lyrics carried the weight of truth, Smith remained unknowable. In Torment Saint, William Todd Schultz gives us the first proper biography of the rock star, a decade after his death, imbued with affection, authority, sensitivity and long-awaited clarity. Torment Saint draws on Schultz's careful, deeply knowledgeable readings and insights, as well as on more than 150 hours of interviews with close friends, lovers, bandmates, peers, managers, label owners, and recording engineers and producers. This book unravels the remaining mysteries of Smith's life and his shocking, too-early end. It will be an indispensable examination of his life and legacy, both for Smith's legions of fans as well as readers still discovering his songbook.

What is "the artist type"? How is an artist's mind structured? What are the links between creativity and mental health? Are there particular personality traits and psychological experiences that great artists have in common? Are most artists really mad? What defines the artist's personality? This book answers these questions by way of a deep, multi-angled, psychological analysis of the personality-based roots of creativity and the creative process. It draws on decades of scientific research focused on the central, mysterious trait of Openness, the true unifying glue behind everything creative. Featuring dozens of notable creators such as John Coltrane, Diane Arbus, Francesca Woodman, David Bowie, Frida Kahlo, Jack Kerouac, John Lennon, and others, this book showcases the nuances of an artist's mind beyond oversimplified formulas that falsely connect art to mental illness, painting a more authentic picture of the structure of the artist's psychology. Ultimately, this book reveals that the "torture" in an artist's perceived image has more to do with personality, creative processes, states of mind, and a need to express trauma symbolically, repeating it in the form of art. As an eminent psychobiographer with an award-winning career as a personality and creativity psychologist, Dr. William Todd Schultz yet again offers his unique perspective on a fascinating topic that is both engaging and insightful. In exploring the precise nature of inner chaos in a wide range of renowned artists, this book takes an enchanting dive into the artistic abyss for all those interested in creativity, personality, and psychology, including both general and academic readers.

Truman Capote was one of the most gifted and flamboyant writers of his generation, renowned for such books as Other Voices, Other Rooms, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and his masterpiece, the nonfiction novel In Cold Blood. What has received comparatively little attention, however, is Capote's last, unfinished book, Answered Prayers, a merciless skewering of cafe society and the high-class women Capote called his "swans." When excerpts appeared he was immediately blacklisted, ruined socially, labeled a pariah. Capote recoiled--disgraced, depressed, and all but friendless.
In Tiny Terror, a new volume in Oxford's Inner Lives series, William Todd Schultz sheds light on the life and works of Capote and answers the perplexing mystery--why did Capote write a book that would destroy him? Drawing on an arsenal of psychological techniques, Schultz illuminates Capote's early years in the South--a time that Capote himself described as a "snake's nest of No's"--no parents to speak of, no friends but books, no hope, no future. Out of this dark childhood emerged Capote's prominent dual life-scripts: neurotic Capote, anxious, vulnerable, hypersensitive, expecting to be hurt; and Capote the disagreeable destroyer, emotionally bulletproof, nasty, and bent on revenge. Schultz shows how Capote would strike out when he felt hurt or taken for granted, engaging in caustic feuds with Gore Vidal, Tennessee Williams, and many other writers. And Schultz reveals how this tendency fed into Answered Prayers, an exceedingly corrosive and thinly disguised roman a clef that trashed his high-society friends.
What emerges by the end of this book is a cogent, immensely insightful portrait of an artist on the edge, brilliantly but self-destructively biting the jet-set hands that fed him. Anyone interested in the inner life of one of America's most fascinating literary personalities will find this book a revelation.

This exceptionally readable and down-to-earth handbook is destined to become the definitive guide to psychobiological research, the application of psychological theory and research to individual lives of historical importance. It brings together for the first time the world's leading psychobiographers, writing lucidly on many of the major figures of our age - from Osama Bin Laden to Elvis Presley. The first section of the book addresses the subject of how to construct an effective psychobiography. Editor William Todd Schultz introduces the field, provides valuable definitions of good and bad psychobiography, discusses an optimal structure for psychobiographical essays, and offers a blueprint for striking psychological paydirt in biographical data. Dan McAdams explores the question of what psychobiographers might learn from current research in personality psychology. Alan Elms delivers wise advice on the tricky subject of theory choice in psychobiography. William Runyan asks why Van Gogh cut off his ear, and in the process explains how one evaluates competing interpretations of the same event in a subject's life. And Kate Isaacson describes a template for use in multiple-case psychobiography. Never before has method in psychobiography been so clearly and explicitly addressed. Those just getting started in the field will find in Section One a detailed roadmap for success. The remaining sections of the book are composed of richly engaging case studies of famous artists, psychologists and politicians. They address compelling questions such as: What are the subjective origins of photographer Diane Arbus's obsession with freaks? In what ways did the early loss of Sylvia Plath's father affect her poetry and presage her suicide? Why did Elvis experience such difficulty singing the song "Are You Lonesome Tonight"? What accounts for Bin Laden' radicalism, Kim Jong II's paranoia, George W Bush's conflict with identity? Why did Freud go disasterously astray in his analysis of Leonardo? What made psychologist Gordon Allport's meeting with Freud so pungently significant? How did the loss of his father determine major elements of Nietzsche's philosophy? These questions and many more get answered, often in surprising and incisive fashion. Additional chapters take up the lives of Harvard operationist S.S. Stevens, Erik Erikson, Edith Wharton, Saddam Hussein, Truman Capote, Kathryn Harrison, Jack Kerouac, and others. Within each case study, tips are proffered along the way as to how psychobiography can be done more cogently, more intelligently, and more valuably. With its combination of telling about and showing how to practice psychobiography wisely, its inclusion of most of the field's leading practitioners, and its diversity of subjects, the Handbook of Psychobiography represents the best the field has to offer. It will define the discipline, set a course for effective future developments, and quickly emerge as a must-read for any beginning or serious psychobiographer, narrative psychologist, personologist or personality researcher.