David’s playful approach invites mutual creativity in the resolution of family problems. His writings illustrate the hospitality, playfulness and “respectworthiness” with which David engages people facing difficult problems. Together with Jennifer Freeman and Dean Lobovits, David co-authored of the book, Playful Approaches to Serious Problems: Narrative Therapy with Children and Their Families, now available in English, Spanish, Chinese and German. David’s book Down Under and Up Over: Travels with Narrative Therapy can be downloaded for free, thanks to the generosity of David and the (UK) Association for Family Therapy & Systemic Practice (AFT).
- Part 1
- Part 2
- Taming the Terrier (a great illustrative chapter of Playful approaches)
Narrative Approaches
In 1997, following the publication of Playful Approaches to Serious Problems, David, along with his co-authors Dean Lobovits and Jennifer Freeman, initiated the website Narrative Approaches. The fully updated website has a number of excellent sections to review:
- About Narrative Therapy with Children
- Narrative Therapy with Children: Resource Page
- Art & Photo Galleries
- Narrative therapy with Families
- The Archive of Resistance: Anti Anorexia/Anti Bulimia
- Narrative Therapy Archive
- Academic Papers
Many Playful Projects
David is a prolific writer engaged in writing projects in collaboration with a number of colleagues. Here is an excerpt from a not-yet-published article, “I am sick of the Problem’s Dirty Tricks” (2010)
“Serena, a disgruntled eleven year old accompanied Jenny, her single-parenting mother in to my office. Jenny wasn’t in a very good mood either. Whatever the problem was, it certainly was one of those that had set each of them at odds with the other. Although when turning and speaking to me, Jenny was polite and good natured, she couldn’t help scowling in response when she looked towards Serena who made no attempt whatsoever at putting on a good face for me. In fact, she looked vengefully at her mother as if she had been injured by her in some way or other. The looks on her face suggested something like this to me: “if you tell him what the Problem is, you will be sorry when we get home afterwards!”
As is my custom, I proposed a tack that caught both of them off guard. “Look, do you mind if we go about this conversation in a way that might be very, very different than what you both might have expected?….