Van der Kolk begins his blockbuster with a discussion of the neuroscience of trauma, complete with explorations of brain anatomy and function and how they underpin reactions to extreme threat. Van der Kolk has substantial legitimacy as a researcher, and his interleaving of the personal and the scientific makes for an engaging read. However, its presentation of the science of trauma is unusually compelling, setting it above most works of popularisation. The book adopts several standard features of the popular psychology genre: case studies from the author’s clinical practice, autobiographical reflections, and sharp critiques of mainstream views to assure readers the author is not merely doing good but slaying dragons in the process. So what is all the fuss about? Bessel van der Kolk, a Dutch-born psychiatrist who has been a successful researcher and clinician in the Boston area since the late 1970s, wrote The Body Keeps the Score as a guide to the understanding and treatment of trauma. Six psychiatric concepts that have mutated: for better or worse They are doing so, at least in part, because the concept’s meaning has been stretched. People are seeing trauma everywhere and re-conceptualising their own experiences of misery and misadventure in its terms. Reckonings with sexual and racial trauma in the wake of #MeToo and Black Lives Matter have combined to raise the cultural profile of trauma, Nicoll suggests.īut alongside this increase in cultural attention, there has been a broadening of what we take trauma to be. The pandemic may have contributed to this surge by bringing collective trauma to our doorsteps, she speculates, but the pre-pandemic upswing suggests other factors are also at play. On, writer Gina Nicoll notes that sales began to liven up around 2018 and then grew in spurts, reaching a peak in 2021. Post-traumatic stress disorder is old news, a staple of psychological chatter for over four decades, and the book doesn’t offer any quick fix solutions for self-helpers.Ĭlues to what has driven The Body Keeps the Score’s success can be found in its sales trajectory. Why a long, dense, and demanding book on the psychology and neurobiology of trauma should occupy so bright a spotlight for so long is not immediately obvious. It has reportedly sold almost 2 million copies. The book has spent more than 150 weeks on the New York Times best seller list for paperback nonfiction, including over half a year in the coveted #1 spot during 2021.

Not so The Body Keeps the Score, a publishing phenomenon that has kept selling long after it first hit the shelves in 2014. If new books are lucky they enjoy a brief honeymoon of attention before ebbing away into oblivion. In a new series, we look at books that have become cultural touchstones.

The body keeps the score