Alice Miller's work in the field of child abuse has attracted international acclaim. In this classic text, Miller embarks on a revolutionary psychoanalytic path in order to explain why child abuse is so widespread and why it is so commonly ignored or overlooked.

She argues that we have used fundamentally mistaken Freudian theories on infantile sexuality to conceal the true nature of the relationship between adults and children. Only when we acknowledge the trauma involved can we begin to understand how childhood repression poisons all subsequent relations for its victims.

Dr Miller combines case histories with dreams, fairy tales and the works of Kafka, Woolf, Flaubert, Beckett and others in a formidable argument for a more compassionate approach to a bewildering problem.