Książki na receptę, recepta na życie
The books on prescription, a recipe for life

Author(s): Wanda Matras-Mastalerz
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego
Summary/Abstract: Books can heal! Appropriately adjusted to reader’s age, needs and interests become animportant element of psychological strategies. They help when we carefully choose them, interest,touch and force thought and reflection. Directed reading from the earliest yearsshould be treated as a strategy of a rational investment in the future. A healing power of theword included in wise texts has been known for the time immemorial. A famous inscription“Psyches iatreion”, that is “A clinic for a soul” was hung before the entrance to the library ofRamzes II in Egyptian Teb in the 13th century BC. Bibliotherapy, as a type of a mental supportbases mainly on the usage of healing and therapeutic values of the literature (literarytherapy, fabletherapy, fairytherapy). Being at the borderline of psychology, medicine,bibliology and pedagogy, it is a kind of help when solving personal problems through directedreading. It gives stimuli for an emotional development, and brings about the enrichmentof imagination, the growth of sensitivity, and empathy, shapes attitudes, broadensvocabulary and knowledge, and is a condition of a critical development of thinking, as wellas can become an inspiration for various forms of an intellectual activity. The book can becomea solution to the problems of an every-day life for each age group of readers. A fascinatingbook allows for a better understanding of ourselves and others, gives a possibility ofa deeper “insight into ourselves” and often constitutes help in defining the sense and aim oflife. Many a time, books can support treatment, supplement a psychological help or even replacethe usage of some pharmacological medicaments. They should be used regularly, accordingto a recipe for a happy and wise life.

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