Ilkley Gazette: Published Thursday 23rd October 2008
By Annette McIntyre

She has been listed as one of the six wisest people in the UK and as one of the "greatest living geniuses" of our time.

With a renown that stretches across the world, she has been described as the psychologist who has changed how we understand depression and happiness It's enough to turn anyone's head really, but clinical psychologist Dorothy Rowe comes across as pleasant, polite and incredibly well-balanced.

The author Sue Townsend has described Rowe as "the calm voice of reason in an increasingly mad world" - and after chatting with the psychologist and writer, it is easy to see why.

The Australian, who has lived in England for the past 40 years, has helped countless people find their way out of the misery of depression, both through her work and through her bestseller, Depression: The Way Out of Your Prison.

And last week she was in Ilkley to publicise her latest work, What Should I Believe?

Rowe's own early life was not the best start. Her own mother was a depressive, who would tell her young daughter that she was fat, ugly and lazy, before threatening to kill her. She went on to marry a man who cheated on her soon after their son was born and who fathered a child with another woman.

She decided to come to England because it was as far away as she could get from Sydney. But now she regularly travels back to visit her son who has since returned.

After making a massive impact on our understanding of depression, Rowe has now turned her attention to religion.

Despite joining the local Methodist church when she was 14 - "because they had boys" - she now does not follow any religion and does not believe in an afterlife. Indeed, she believes religion is now a political issue and that interpretations of religion can be dangerous.

"If you believe that you are a superior person simply because you hold certain beliefs and because you are so superior you are entitled to punish other people, then you cause pain and disaster for other people."