Dr Leon Redler

Dr Leon Redler

Leon Redler qualified in Medicine in New York (1962) and left a psychiatric residency there when invited to work with Maxwell Jones and R D Laing in the UK.

"Joe Berke introduced me to Laing who, in turn, invited me to join him and his colleagues in what he hoped could be an asylum and refuge from an increasingly dysfunctional world for some of the founders, Laing, Esterson, Cooper, Briskin and others…but especially an asylum, or place where one wouldn’t be violated, for people immersed in ‘mental’ (but can it really be isolated?) suffering and/or feeling or being felt to be disturbed and disturbing to others."

He remains one of two honorary members of the Philadelphia Association, albeit in a more peripheral role, continuing to constantly question and challenge the direction and nature of the Association in an evolving and increasingly regulated field. In his own words; "Perhaps there are times when playing at the margins, as well as playing with the margins (taking an inspiration from the late philosopher Jacques Derrida, in diverse texts and contexts) is a better option than the alternatives."

He remains in London, practicing psychotherapy and teaching. His paper, We All Go Astray, can be read at the on-line journal, Radical Psychology (Volume 7, Issue 2)