An internationally-known scholar in
psychohistory and political psychology, Falk presents his psychoanalytic biography of Shmiel Yosef Agnon, the only Hebrew writer to win the Nobel Prize in Literature.
Unless the reader is familiar with at least some of the books, it may be rough sledding to follow the closely constructed analyses that scroll through extensive plot summaries; fortunately, the "Encyclopedia," which takes up over five times as many pages as the introduction, is there for the reader to check up on specific names of characters, planets, and concepts such as "
Psychohistory," "Prime Radiant," "Seldon Crisis," and the like.
In Isaac Asimov's science fiction series Foundation, mathematician Hari Seldon develops the fictitious science of
Psychohistory, a major theory that combines elements of psychology, mathematics and statistics.
The presidential campaign that astounded the world: A
psychohistory of Donald Trump and the 2016 American election.
Asimov would publish "Foundation" in 1951, the first of an influential series that explored the history of a galactic empire, with the central theme of a fictional form of mathematics known as "
psychohistory", which is capable of predicting the future on a large scale.
in The Journal of
Psychohistory 25.3 (1998): N.p., accessed 29 Dec.
And his autobiography unexpectedly deepens into
psychohistory as memories of Stella overwhelm him.
There was
psychohistory, a term Suny applied to Robert Tucker's biography of Stalin and an approach he also experimented with himself.
Even when done appropriately with great care and without bias,
psychohistory is at most a supplement to the study of society.
This kind of psychobiography is one of the weaker aspects of the book, flowing as it does from Friedman's close connection to the Erik Erikson, Robert Coles and Robert Jay Lifton network that runs the well-known Well-Fleet
psychohistory gatherings.
Kohut, whose background is largely in
psychohistory, comes to the study of generations to understand how historical events shape the human psyche.