Letters To A Young Psychologist, By Ignacio Solares

Thinking of studying psychology? Do you know someone who has this motivation? Would you like to delve into some of the historical events of this science and find out how it has progressed? This work by Ignacio Solares collects historical data that you will find interesting. Thus, today we present a book written with love for all those who like the subject, do not have a clear idea and are willing to satisfy your curiosity.

Ignacio Solares wrote more than two hundred pages to answer his daughter’s question, hence the close tone of the book, close in style to other famous people we may have read, such as The Book of Sofia. The end? Support her to make a good professional decision.

about the author

Ignacio Solares is a Mexican writer with a career of more than 15 published titles. He has received several recognitions and an award named after him for his dedication to historical narrative. It should be noted that he is not an expert in the area of ​​applied psychology, but he is an expert in the areas of philosophy, literature and history. It is here where most of his works take value. The data it provides is supported by a modest but very valuable bibliography.

Before you start reading

Letters to a Young Psychologist  is  published for the first time in 2003 in Mexico City. The text belongs to the epistolary genre, that is, it is made up of a series of correspondences. Each of the twelve letters that make up this text offers us a theoretical and historical overview of a topic that Ignacio Solares considers is important for the “young psychologist” to know.

The book is not the only one of its kind, you may have heard other titles such as:

• Letters to a young novelist-  Mario Vargas Llosa
• Letters to a Young Poet –  Rainer Maria Rilke
• Letters to a Young Mathematician –  Ian Stewart. Among others.

In them there is a constant, that the young person (call himself a novice, beginner, layman, etc. age does not matter) has an accessible door to enter an area so wide that it can overwhelm at the beginning of his study ; in this case, Psychology.

As we said before, Ignacio Solares starts from his daughter’s question to write twelve letters in which he will try to explain the object of study of psychology and its evolution.  They address topics such as psychoanalysis, the collective unconscious, the theory of synchronicity, behaviorism, pragmatism, among others. They also played an important role in laying the foundations for science. It is written with a fluent and easy-to-understand narrative.

Can you imagine being able to read part of the conversations that these thinkers had in those times? Ignacio Solares takes up several fragments of correspondence from different authors; for example, correspondence between Jung and Freud, Freud and Charcot, and others. Also fragments of the notes of some of them like Mesmer. Of course, there is complete material that deals with the subject, but encompassing it is not one of the book’s claims.

Of course, now your work can answer many other people who are interested in knowing a little more about the subject. That, like their daughter, they are undecided about whether Psychology is for them, or not. This work can inspire the beginning of the career of a great psychologist.

Who could enjoy reading Ignacio Solares?

I think that as avid readers we enjoy imagining and thinking in different contexts and times. And what better way to do it than to do it in the area that we both enjoy or are interested in, psychology. Let’s not forget the title of this work, since the book is dedicated mainly to “young psychologists”, that is to say, psychologists who are beginning their studies, young people who are undecided about the career they will choose, and so on.

Even if you are not familiar with the area, Ignacio Solares will propose a long trip back in time, but at the same time concrete,  trying to cover and review the most important events that have occurred in the growth of psychology as a branch of knowledge ( not so much as science: this is one of the criticisms we can make of the book).

Reading it won’t make you an expert, of course, but the time invested will pay off. Being the beginning of a thread, his idea is that once the book is over, you are the one who approaches the original authors to know first-hand their way of thinking and their most important contributions to psychology. It is a map for explorers that, at the same time, will help you to continue exploring in the terrain that it announces.