Dr James Gordon working with children in Kosovo

Perhaps it has always been this way. But it seems that we have been inundated with disasters – both man-made and natural – recently. Japan; New Zealand; Haiti. In each case, our TV screens are filled with images of rescue workers. Countless aid agencies are active, from Save the Children to the medical wing of the Israeli Army, delivering essential humanitarian aid. But what about the psychological damage?

This is where Dr James Gordon, a 69-year-old psychiatrist from Washington DC fits in. Gordon is a big man with a flashing smile and something of the evangelist about him. His medical credentials are impressive: Harvard and the National Institute of Mental Health, a former adviser to Presidents Carter and Clinton. But he is also an expert in alternative medicine. In 1991, he founded the Centre for Mind-Body Medicine, which “combines the precision of modern science with the wisdom of the world’s healing traditions”. And he has made it his mission to work in disaster zones.

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Philip Sallon and Boy George

They’ve put him in a private room. Through the window, the London Eye can be seen turning languidly in the heat. On the table there is a jar of gefilte fish and a can of pickles; on the wall is a get-well-soon card from the Pet Shop Boys. A bouquet of flowers from Vivienne Westwood (who was turned away by hospital staff, having arrived outside visiting hours) is on the windowsill. And lying in bed, pale, bruised and dishevelled – yet nevertheless looking irrepressibly pre-Raphaelite – is the iconic gay socialite Philip Sallon, his extravagant black hair forming a corona around his head.

“I still feel weird. Like it’s a dream or something,” he tells me. “When they first brought me in, I couldn’t even remember the details of my parents’ deaths. And now I’m suffering from terrible headaches. Does my memory seem all right to you?”

The night before, Sallon – a committed, if not religious, Jew – hosted a Passover “Seder night” in the ward (hence the gefilte fish, the pickles). Among the guests were Boy George and Matt Lucas’s mother. But after a while, plagued by severe headaches, Sallon retired to bed.

In Piccadilly Circus, central London, in the early hours of April 3, Sallon was seriously assaulted. Having suffered a haemorrhage on the brain, he was given a 50/50 chance of survival. Now, with the aid of round-the-clock medical care, he has stabilised. The reason for the attack remains unknown; his memory of it is blank.

The police investigation is moving slowly. Detectives have released a description of the suspect: an athletic, six-foot male of around 20; short black hair; a tight, royal blue T-shirt; jeans; black trainers. “Several people came to Philip’s aid after the attack,” says Mick Forteath, the detective leading the investigation. “But so far they haven’t come forward. We’re appealing to anyone who saw the assault itself, the prelude, or the aftermath, to come and talk to us.”

Read the rest of the article on the Guardian website

Ok, so will you take half a biscuit?

From spending cuts and coalition politics to the Israel-Palestine talks, it’s hard to escape from negotiations these days. But according to Stuart Diamond, the Pulitzer prize-winning journalist, university lecturer and former adviser to the UN, it’s not just the movers and shakers of this world who should be focusing on how to negotiate, it’s all of us.

“Everyone instinctively wants to get more,” he says. “It doesn’t have to be more for me and less for you. It just has to be, well, more.” Now Diamond has turned his idea into a new book which shows us how to get what we want in a bewildering array of scenarios.

For example: a couple tries to board a plane after the gate has closed. They stand at the window and catch the pilot’s eye, pulling long faces. It works; the pilot feels sorry for them, and instructs the ground crew to let them on. “Without uttering a word, they got through to the decision-maker,” Diamond explains. “They focused on their goals, not the rights and wrongs. They made human contact, and encouraged the pilot to use his authority to help them.”

When dealing with a faceless corporation, however, different techniques are needed. “One of my students was served soggy french fries at McDonald’s five minutes before closing,” he says. “When the worker refused to replace them, my student calmly pointed to the McDonald’s Freshness Guarantee. He got his new french fries.” So what’s the theory? “He used the company’s own standards against them,” he explains. “That’s a persuasive way to reach your goals.”

In a “hard bargain” situation, however, it’s best to be incremental. “A great example is the movie Five Easy Pieces,” says Diamond. “Jack Nicholson is refused a side order of toast at a diner. He orders a toasted chicken sandwich and negotiates to lose the mayo, the butter, the lettuce, then finally the chicken. He leads the waitress step-by-step to his original goal.”

These strategies have a wide range of applications, says Diamond. Take children, for instance. “The key point is to let them into the decision-making process. If they say, ‘I want a biscuit now!’ you can ask, ‘Why now? It’s so close to dinnertime, will you take half a biscuit?’”

In the adult world, much negotiation takes place via email. “Emails are tricky because they have very little tone,” says Diamond. “They’re like tofu; they take on the flavour of whatever the recipient is feeling.” The answer? To add the tone back in. “Start with something like ‘Please hear this email as friendly’,” he suggests. “It will help soften the mood.” Other tips include starting an email with a line of smalltalk (“Hope you’ve recovered from your cold”), being up-front if you’re in a bad mood, approximating the other person’s communication style, and keeping emails short.

So if I do all this, what can be achieved? “The sky’s the limit,” Diamond says. “You could make £1m.” I pause for a moment. “How about £2m?”

20% of the UK population will suffer from depression – double 30 years ago

Dr Steve Ilardi is slim and enthusiastic, with intense eyes. The clinical psychologist is 4,400 miles away, in Kansas, and we are chatting about his new book via Skype, the online videophone service. “I’ve spent a lot of time pondering Skype,” he says. “On the one hand it provides a degree of social connectedness. On the other, you’re still essentially by yourself.” But, he concludes, “a large part of the human cortex is devoted to the processing of visual information, so I guess Skype is less alienating than voice calls.”

Social connectedness is important to Ilardi. In The Depression Cure, he argues that the brain mistakenly interprets the pain of depression as an infection. Thinking that isolation is needed, it sends messages to the sufferer to “crawl into a hole and wait for it all to go away”. This can be disastrous because what depressed people really need is the opposite: more human contact.

Which is why social connectedness forms one-sixth of his “lifestyle based” cure for depression. The other five elements are meaningful activity (to prevent “ruminating” on negative thoughts); regular exercise; a diet rich in omega-3 fatty acids; daily exposure to sunlight; and good quality, restorative sleep.

The programme has one glaring omission: anti-depressant medication. Because according to Ilardi, the drugs simply don’t work. “Meds have only around a 50% success rate,” he says. “Moreover, of the people who do improve, half experience a relapse. This lowers the recovery rate to only 25%. To make matters worse, the side effects often include emotional numbing, sexual dysfunction and weight gain.”

As a respected clinical psychologist and university professor, Ilardi’s views are hard to dismiss. A research team at his workplace, the University of Kansas, has been testing his system – known as TLC (Therapeutic Lifestyle Change) – in clinical trials. The preliminary results show, he says, that every patient who put the full programme into practice got better.

Ilardi is convinced that the medical profession’s readiness to prescribe anti-depression medication is obscuring an important debate. Up to 20% of the UK population will have clinical depression at some point, he says – twice as many as 30 years ago. Where has this depression epidemic come from?

The answer, he suggests, lies in our lifestyle. “Our standard of living is better now than ever before, but technological progress comes with a dark underbelly. Human beings were not designed for this poorly nourished, sedentary, indoor, sleep-deprived, socially isolated, frenzied pace of life. So depression continues its relentless march.”

Our environment may have evolved rapidly but our physical evolution hasn’t kept up. “Our genome hasn’t moved on since 12,000 years ago, when everyone on the planet were hunter- gatherers,” he says. “Biologically, we still have Stone Age bodies. And when Stone Age body meets modern environment, the health consequences can be disastrous.”

To counteract this Ilardi focuses on the aspects of a primitive lifestyle that militate against depression. “Hunter- gatherer tribes still exist today in some parts of the world,” he says, “and their level of depression is almost zero. The reasons? They’re too busy to sit around brooding. They get lots of physical activity and sunlight. Their diet is rich in omega-3, their level of social connection is extraordinary, and they regularly have as much as 10 hours of sleep.” Ten hours? “We need eight. At the moment we average 6.7.”

So we should all burn our possessions and head out into the forest? “Of course not,” Iladi shudders. “That would be like a lifelong camping trip with 30 close relatives for company. Nobody would recommend that.”

Instead we can adapt our modern lifestyle to match our genome by harnessing modern technology, such as fish oil supplements to increase our intake of omega-3. All well and good. But I can’t escape the feeling that the six-step programme seems like common sense. Isn’t it obvious that more sleep, exercise and social connectedness are good for you?

“The devil is in the detail,” replies Ilardi. “People need to know how much sunlight is most effective, and at which time of day. And taking supplements, for example, is a complex business. You need anti-oxidants to ensure that the fish oil is effective, as well as a multivitamin. Without someone spelling it out, most people would never do it.”

“Everyone can benefit from the six-step programme, not just the clinically depressed,” Ilardi continues. “People who are too depressed to get motivated, or those who are very disadvantaged, might need someone to coach them through it. And before coming off medication, you should consult a doctor. But ultimately, the depression cure can work for everyone.”

Ilardi practises the programme himself. He’s never been depressed, he tells me, but it increases his sense of wellbeing and reduces his absentmindedness (his college nickname was “Spaced”).

It all makes sense, but will I try it myself? I don’t suffer from depression, but wellbeing sounds nice. I’m not so sure about the fish oil, but I might just give it a go.

Enjoy the sunshine, get plenty of sleep – and be sociable

Diet: The brain is 60% fat. Deficiencies in Omega 3 fatty acids can leave the brain prone to depression. Take 1500mg of Omega 3 daily (1000mg of EPA and 500mg of DHA) in the form of fish oil capsules, together with a multivitamin and a 500mg Vitamin C supplement. These last two are antioxidants. They protect the fish oil from becoming spoiled by the oxygen in your system.

Meaningful activity: Create a list of engaging activities. Use it when you notice yourself “ruminating,” or dwelling on negative thoughts. Even conversation counts.

Exercise: Aim for 90 minutes per week, ideally in three 30 minute sessions. Choose activities that are enjoyable and have a clear purpose, such as walking to a destination or playing sport. No exercise bikes or treadmills.

Sunlight: Natural light stimulates the brain’s production of serotonin, which reduces depression. Fifteen to thirty minutes of sunlight each morning is enough in the summer. In the winter, consider using a lightbox.

Social connection: The brain treats depression like an infection and mistakenly tells us to isolate ourselves. Counteract this by making a conscious effort to be sociable. Be open about your depression, but don’t let it dominate the conversation.

Restorative sleep: 8 hours of sleep is ideal. Use your bed only for sleeping, and sleep at regular times. Avoid bright light, caffeine and alcohol at night. Stay away from napping and turn down your thermostat at bedtime. Think relaxing thoughts in bed, and don’t try to fall asleep!

NB: The sections in italics were cut, or edited down, when this piece appeared in the Guardian. Read the Guardian version here.

'As a parent it is my duty to acknowledge that the strands that weave the tapestry of our identities are not singular, but multiple'

The prospect of Britain and Israel going to war is an unlikely one. At the orthodox Jewish school that I attended, however, it must have seemed like a distinct possibility. We used to regularly debate which side we would fight for. Although steeped in religious observance, we had been born in England, grew up here, and developed strong allegiances to English football teams. We spoke little modern Hebrew and had been to Israel just a handful of times. Nevertheless, the feeling was unanimous: we would take up arms on behalf of the Jewish state.

From one point of view, we were simply using a primitive thought experiment to mould our nascent sense of identity. At the same time, however, this was more than just an abstract exercise. Many of my schoolmates volunteered for the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) after completing their A-levels and my younger brother, Zack, was among them.

When we were growing up, every aspect of our world was dominated by religion. Outside influences were guarded against, television and non-religious music was forbidden, and only certain books were allowed. Denim and T-shirts were prohibited in favour of formal clothes in subdued colours. Our hair had to be kept short, with a prescribed length maintained around the temples. Boys and girls were kept wholly separate; it was forbidden to make even inadvertent physical contact with the opposite sex. Yet at the same time, our schools followed the national curriculum (alongside a Jewish syllabus), we spoke and thought in English, and our parents had jobs in the secular world.

All this meant that we felt profoundly alienated from the Britain that surrounded us. Notwithstanding the UK’s liberalism, we were frequently abused and sometimes attacked in the street. It was accepted by us that Jews should always have a valid passport, in case “it should happen again”. As adolescents, this social confusion and loss of identification with British society meant we needed something to rally around. Orthodox Judaism wasn’t enough, as it was defined more by what you couldn’t do than what you could. Israel, however, though we barely knew the place, gave us a banner of which we could feel proud. Our Jerusalem was not dissimilar to William Blake’s; it inspired in us a fervour that only an idealised vision could.

But Zack and I had not always been surrounded by Judaism. Our mother had grown up in a completely assimilated environment, with no connection to religion at all. Her family may be Jewish, but they have been secular for generations. The man she married – my father – is not Jewish, and until I was five, Judaism was irrelevant. I lived the life of an average English child; I still have photographs of myself at the age of three, taking part in a nativity play. Then my father left, and my mother started to attend study sessions at the local liberal synagogue. Despite her secular upbringing, she had always felt an instinctive resonance with Judaism. Gradually, she became more heavily involved, progressing through the spectrum of Judaism from liberal to reform, and eventually to orthodox.

Our lives underwent incremental changes. Dietary laws were introduced at home, then basic observance of the Sabbath. We were given new, Hebrew names and enrolled in all-Jewish schools following an orthodox ethos. As if living under a witness protection programme, before long we were completely segregated from mainstream society and living utterly different lives. We had less and less contact with my father, who as a non-Jew became increasingly isolated from our way of life. The lid was down, and for the rest of our childhoods that was how it remained.

But subversive influences were never far away. My Jewish grandfather, an avowed atheist and a rascal to the core, would delight in disparaging the “mumbo-jumbo” of religion when my mother’s back was turned. He crowed about the freedom and joie de vivre that he, as a non-believer, enjoyed. Even my mother could not help but send out mixed messages. The orthodox ideology, despite its potency, was unable to eclipse her secular upbringing; a provincial public school education had bequeathed to her an irrepressible love of early music, Georgian architecture and Victorian novels, which sat uncomfortably alongside her daily devotions and shtetl cooking. To this day, she bakes kosher mince pies at Christmas. This added extra notes of dissonance to an overwhelmingly proscriptive way of life.

Things changed for me as I finished my A-levels, when – in preparation for a planned stint in the IDF – I joined a gym. This became my first social contact with non-Jews, and it radically widened my perspective. I began to rethink my religion, and very quickly its hold over me began to fall away. I had grown tired of feeling like a perennial outsider for no discernible benefit. I’d had enough of not being able to turn lights off on a Saturday or visit non-kosher restaurants, or walk with my head uncovered; it seemed outmoded and devoid of wisdom. Before long I had abandoned my plans to join the IDF, and decided instead to spend my gap year travelling in Asia.

My mother was devastated. She believed that I was contributing towards the deterioration of Jewish traditions that had remained intact for thousands of years. But I didn’t look back. Years later, in what must have been a difficult concession, she confided that she respected my independence of mind even though she condemned my lifestyle. When I won a place at Oxford, and later published a novel, she was proud. But her pride was always tinged with sadness.

Meanwhile, Zack joined the British wing of a Jewish youth movement called Betar, a rightwing activist group linked to the modern-day Likud party. Founded in prewar Latvia, its mission statement was to engineer a breed of Jews who were “proud, generous and fierce”, in contrast to the enfeebled, ghettoised Jews of eastern Europe. Zack was initially attracted by the paintball, barbecues and trips to Israel. Over time, however, he learned of the organisation’s history. This was a group that fought the Nazis in the Warsaw ghetto uprising, rescued 40,000 Jews from the Holocaust in daring evacuations to Palestine, and – under the command of Menachem Begin – drove the British out of the Jewish homeland by force of arms. Betar provided Zack with a red-blooded ideology, one more compelling than stultifying religion, and infused with a sense of adventure. Here at last was a legitimate way to escape the claustrophobia of orthodoxy, and it led directly to Israel and the IDF.

I remember trying to talk him out of joining the army. At the time, my position was weak; my ideology and politics were in flux, and my arguments were nowhere near as coherent as Zack’s. He, on the other hand, was filled with certainty. His ambiguities and frustrations had been transmuted into a pride in being part of a people that has survived for thousands of years, in the teeth of the most prolonged and vicious persecution the world has ever known. He argued that rather than seeking to keep the outside world – in all its manifestations – at bay, Zionism meant creating and defending a land of our own where we could live in freedom. If Israel had existed in 1939, he said, the Holocaust may never have happened. In Israel, things are different. Israel belongs to us. It may be far from secure, but it is a place where a Jew can live – and if necessary die – with pride, and in freedom.

Zack was trained as a combat medic. His army service was spent largely on the West Bank, patrolling the perimeter fence, manning checkpoints, quelling riots, and supporting commando incursions. He remained in the army for 18 months, and, to my relief, during that time he neither seriously injured anybody, nor was seriously injured himself. He returned to England a changed person. Changed, I had to admit, for the better. The army had given him a new fortitude, an easy independence and a keen sense of duty. No longer was he troubled by the stifling excesses of diaspora orthodoxy. The army had changed him into a man.

Over the years, my relationship with Judaism has evolved. I have never entertained the possibility of returning to the religion, but I have been involved with the wider community to a greater or lesser extent, not least through my writing. I am finishing an intricately researched novel about the Kindertransport, in which I have a very deep personal investment. In some ways, I envy the certainty that Zack enjoys. I have three children now – a two-year-old and six-month-old twins – and my partner is not Jewish – or at least, her father is Jewish but not her mother, which is unacceptable from the orthodox perspective. What is missing for people such as me, who have found the dominant cultures of their birth untenable, is a coherent group mythology, shared traditions and a sense of belonging.

Isobel and I have been engaged for years but we remain unmarried, as we didn’t know what sort of wedding we wanted and whether everybody would come and support it. Yet despite all this, I feel content that my children will be brought up without restrictions, prejudice or superstition. They will understand which things in life are knowable and which are not, and I will never try to tell them otherwise. As a parent it is my duty to acknowledge that the strands that weave the tapestry of our identities are not singular, but multiple. What they choose to do in their own lives is up to them, but my hope is that what they lose in tradition, they will gain in integrity.

'The masterful literary photographer'

“I’m crazy about Chekhov”, Woody Allen once remarked. “I never knew anyone that wasn’t.” Today, on Chekhov’s 150th birthday, that statement rings truer than ever. Much has been written about the enduringly modern quality of Chekhov’s work, and with good reason. He is one of the most frequently cited influences of contemporary writers, and it is possible to argue that echoes of his brevity, impressionism, and disregard for traditional plot resonate through the majority of modern literary fiction and drama.

Chekhov’s genius is not limited to his plays and stories. He was a prolific letter-writer, and his correspondence offers a tantalising glimpse into his revolutionary approach to aesthetics. He often offered pieces of advice to other writers, and several have since hardened into accepted principles of writing. The most famous of these is commonly known as Chekhov’s Gun, which he defined in a letter to Lazarev-Gruzinsky, his one-time co-writer, in November 1889: “one should not put a loaded rifle onto the stage if no one is thinking of firing it,” he wrote. “If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one, it should be fired. Otherwise don’t put it there.” The essence of the metaphor is clear: economy is everything.

It is this mastery of succinctness, in which even the minutest detail is loaded with disproportionate meaning, that forms the kernel of Chekhov’s legacy. Chekhov was a writer of increments. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Three Sisters, his 1901 play of domestic verisimilitude, in which the characters yearn to leave the drudgery of the provinces and go to Moscow. Like the pistol on the wall, every detail is vital to the story. As the protagonists grow more preoccupied, the realisation dawns that the journey will never be made; the atmosphere is unbearably pregnant, but ultimately nothing happens. It is not difficult to see this as a forerunner of Waiting For Godot. Indeed, Masha’s final line, “We’ve got to live … we’ve got to live,” would sit comfortably alongside Beckett’s famous articulation of the human condition, “I can’t go on, I’ll go on.”

Chekhov’s short stories, too, are discussed frequently in his correspondence. In an 1886 letter to his brother, he enumerated six core principles, all of which iterated a single belief: authentic writing seeks to depict the world itself, not an interpretation of it. The Lady with the Little Dog, which portrays a developing affair, has no point of origin or conclusion. The beginning and end of the story lie outside of the text itself. But beginnings and endings are irrelevant. As Chekhov summarised in a letter to Alexei Suvorin in 1888: “One has to write what one sees, what one feels, truthfully, sincerely … my concern is to write, not to teach!”

One of his key innovations was to break with the realist school of Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy, which sought to elevate the reader through moral messages couched within literature. Chekhov aimed to write about life as it is. Tolstoy famously missed the point. “Chekhov is a photographer”, he is said to have remarked, “a very talented photographer, but just a photographer”. How could he know that 150 years later, “show don’t tell” would become the mantra of the modern writer?

Chekhov’s accomplishment as a masterful literary photographer can be seen most sharply in the transmutation of Wood Demon, one of his earlier plays, into the work that became known as Uncle Vanya. Wood Demon was such a flop that Chekhov gave up writing for months. First performed in 1889, it was a melodrama featuring a predictable plot, an Aristotelian climax (the suicide of Vanya), and a positive resolution at the end. A decade later, Chekhov revisited the play and re-wrote it. The result was a masterpiece. “The writer is not a pastry chef,” Chekhov wrote to Maria Kiselyova in 1887. “Not a cosmetician and not an entertainer. He is a man bound by contract to his sense of duty and his conscience … the writer should be just as objective as the chemist.”

In Uncle Vanya, we see Chekhov writing not just as a photographer, but as a scientific observer. The play is a masterpiece of unblinking empirical impressionism, rejecting all the norms of plot and dialogue in favour of fragmented dialogue, a pseudo-climax in the form of a bungled murder attempt, pervasive understatement, and unseen events and characters acting as sources of dramatic tension. Along with works such as The Seagull and The Cherry Orchard, Uncle Vanya became hailed as a great work of drama whose influence could be seen in the work of such diverse playwrights as Arthur Miller, Tennessee Williams and Bertolt Brecht.

Chekhov will be remembered for the innovative brilliance of his stories and plays. But nowhere is his genius more apparent than in his codification of what would become the founding principles of modern writing. He wasn’t just ahead of his own time; in many ways, we are still trying catch up with him.