Amazon.co.uk talks to Sam Vaknin

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Amazon.co.uk: Where are you from? How--if at all--has your sense of place coloured your writing?

S.V.: I was born in Israel to Jewish immigrants from Turkey and Morocco. We belonged to a socially and economically backward minority - which might explain what led to my interest in Narcissistic defense mechanisms. Israel is an aggressive, militaristic, power-driven, intolerant, religious and conservative society. Enclaves of liberal thinking do exist but they are outweighed and diluted by the general populace.It is an odd admixture of the Western indulgence of the individual (Lasch's narcissistic society)coupled with strong compensatory mechanisms employed in an effort to counter-balance a national inferiority complex and survival anxiety.This coalesces into the clinical picture known as "pathological narcissism" - which is the subject of my book.

Amazon.co.uk: When and why did you begin writing? When did you first consider yourself an author?

S.V.: I wrote all my life. It was my prefered venue of escape. I published short fiction, works of reference and columns in periodicals. Writing sits well with my personality disorder. It provides me with narcissistic supply. It is magical in that symbols lead to action. It provides the twin illusions of eternity and sagaciousness. I have never thought of myself as anything but an author.

Amazon.co.uk: Who or what has influenced your writing, and in what way? What books have most influenced your life?

S.V.: I have always been drawn to short fiction - although most of my published work (in Hebrew, Macedonian, other languages) is non-fiction.There is an essence in short fiction, distilled and aromatic which is missing in the homeopathic equivalent of the longer genres (such as the novel). I have thus found myself enamoured with A.A.Poe on one end of the spectrum - and Francoise Sagan on the other. The last two decades have been a revelation to me in that they provided me with legitimacy. My short fiction deals with amoral characters, making amoral decisions about emotionally harrowing (to them, emotionally neutral) situations. Post modernism liberated me and allowed me to pursue this line of writing.

Amazon.co.uk: What is the most romantic book you've ever read? The scariest? The funniest?

S.V.: I try to abstain from romantic literature and am pretty successful at doing so.The scariest book I ever read is the Amityville Horror. It took a whole sleepless night to wear off.The funniest book I read is "Three Men in a Boat" by Jerome K. Jerome. I love wry, marginally vicious humour.

Amazon.co.uk: What music, if any, most inspires you to write? What do you like to listen to while writing?

S.V.: I hate music. All types of music. It makes me intolerably sad. It osmotically infiltrates me, cell-level, and drowns me. Short of breath I barely make it to the gramophone (I prefer vinyl records) and turn it off.

Amazon.co.uk: What are you reading now? What CD is currently in your stereo?

S.V.: I am reading David Deutsch's "The Fabric of Reality". To me, it is a funeral. The death of science. When highly qualified physicists engage in metaphysics, even mysticism - both disciplines emerge the lesser for their efforts.

Amazon.co.uk: What are you working on?

S.V.: I have just finished writing my second book of short stories (in Hebrew) and submitted it.I am augmenting "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" with additional chapter (available online and to the book purchasers via email). And I am columnizing ferrociously on the Kosovo crisis. I used to live in Yugoslavia and Macedonia until 1998, so I know the area and its inhabitants first hand.

Amazon.co.uk: Use this space to write about whatever you wish.

S.V.: Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Re-Visited was written under extreme conditions of duress. It was composed in jail as I was trying to understand what had hit me. My nine years old marriage dissolved, my finances were in a shocking condition, my family estranged, my reputation ruined, my personal freedom severely curtailed. Slowly, the realization that it was all my fault, that I was sick and needed help penetrated the decades old defenses that I erected around me. This book is the documentation of a road of self-discovery. It was a painful process, which led to nowhere. I am no different - and no healthier - today than I was when I wrote this book. My disorder is here to stay, the prognosis is poor and alarming.

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