Return of my website

Tuesday, 07 June 2011 23:10

In February 2011 my website was hacked by someone apparently in Algeria. As soon as he discovered this, Grant, my website host, closed the hole through which the attack had come but by then the damage had been done. We decided that, instead of simply repairing the damage, Grant and his developer Nick would create a new website. Louise and I gave them a list of the changes and additions we wanted. All this took some time. Grant lives on the beautiful north coast of NSW and Nick in the wilds of the Northern Tableland while Louise and I live in London. So it

was not a matter of just popping next door for a discussion.  Meanwhile the list of new material to go on the website was lengthening. I had spent the English winter, first, travelling to via the USA to Sydney and then in Australia witnessing secondhand and sometimes firsthand the floods, fires, and heatwaves. During the first part of the Queensland floods I wrote a piece for Guardian Online. I predicted that as soon as the floods had eased the politicians would start arguing over who would pay the costs and how much. I wasn't wrong. I gave some lectures and was interviewed on the ABC.

After I returned to London I was looking through my old website and realised that I had written many more introductions to and chapters of books than were on my website. My research papers were of interest only to other Personal Construct psychologists but there were introductions to important books like Jeffrey Masson's book Against Therapy. Some of the chapters I had written for edited books went back twenty years and related to events in the world at that time. I decided to get this material scanned and put on the website. However, selecting and preparing the books for scanning took quite a long time so it will be newer material that goes on the website first.

Not long before I left for Australia the writer Peter Stanford got in touch with me to ask me to write an afterword for a book he was editing. This was The Death of a Child, a book of chapters written by people each of whom had lost a child they had had or a sibling. This book illustrates how, when people talk of 'closure' and 'getting on with your life' they show that they understand nothing of the nature of grief.

 

Last modified on Tuesday, 09 August 2011 08:59