ABSTRACT
Dan is an architect, a friend I have known for fifteen years, his dark hair grey at the temples. He is smart, generous, and witty. He knows of my interest in psychosis and has come to visit me to talk about his younger brother, who was recently diagnosed as schizophrenic. He is puzzled by his brother’s language and frustrated with his doctors. This is the first of four visits. We sit at the dining room table in Amherst, Massachusetts on a weekend evening in early October. Dan begins, frowning in the way he does when he is baffled.
