Atelier d'écriture thérapeutique

Due to the specific rules that govern it—time, duration, place, objectives—writing in a workshop setting allows one to engage in a therapeutic process. In addition to the workshop's structured constraints are the rules inherent to prose or poetic genres, the instructions tied to a given theme, models to follow, and more.

This environment, which provides a containing and structured framework, enables the patient to feel sufficiently reassured and supported to explore, to experiment with new fields of understanding, and to better discover themselves by granting access to their imaginative life.This process, initiated by writing, allows many patients—regardless of age—to find an alternative to speech to express the unspeakable, and then to process it.

Structured in four parts—history and theory, indications, presentation of various narrative forms, and tools for the therapist—this manual helps in understanding this type of therapeutic mediation, which is also an artistic one. From slam poetry to the villanelle, from haiku to cadavre exquis (exquisite corpse), from tautograms to fairy tales, the author explores the richness of literary forms, turning them into therapeutic tools.

A "therapist's guide" presents the resources needed to quickly launch a workshop: step-by-step session plans, numerous clinical vignettes, and 315 themes to offer participants.This book is intended for therapists interested in writing as a therapeutic medium, as well as for any professionals wishing to set up a writing workshop.This second edition includes a more substantial section on psychotrauma, with new clinical vignettes and a presentation of workshops that distinguish between individual and group practices.