The Quiet Man

About the Book

This book is written in the form of a play about a group. Twelve strangers gather, each with the expectation of what the purpose of the group should be. How should the group be defined?

Is it an educational class, or is it therapy, or is it something else? The members wait for the Group Leader to define an agenda but he remains mysteriously silent. This silence on his part remained over the four month period of the life of the group in which the only words he spoke were to dismiss the group at the end of each session. Each of the embers defines what he or she believes is the meaning of the silence, some defending it, others attacking it. As their anxiety and hostility wax and wane and as their vivid interactions create the unique personalities of the members there is a gradual relinquishment of the need for a formal authority. Indeed the book could be summarized as a modest study of the nature and enigma of authority.

About the Author

Bartelme was born in Wisconsin and moved westward in his childhood and adolescence through Iowa and Minnesota where he received a Master's degree at the University of Minnesota. During World War Two he spent three years I the U.S. Merchant Marine. After the war he married and moved to California where he received a PhD in psychology at Berkeley. He then worked for five years with the Oakland Kaiser/ Permanente health plan as the head of a Psychology Clinic before moving on to a professoriate at San Francisco State University from which he is now retired. He was politically active during the 1960s, indeed spending two weeks at the Santa rita jail for Vietnam era protesting. He and his wife have three children beloved but widely scattered. He enjoys English sit-coms especially one called waiting For God, and coincidentally his favorite play, Becket's Waiting For Godot. He finds writing a pleasurable way to kill time.