R. D. Laing

Ronald David Laing

1927 (Glasgow) – 1989 (St Tropez)

As a psychiatrist associated with the anti-psychiatry movement, Laing remains controversial. Winnicott and Bowlby were senior colleagues at the Tavistock Clinic in London; Winnicott was his supervisor, and responded warmly to Laing’s ‘The Divided Self’. Trocchi, a fellow-Glaswegian and counter-cultural icon, counted Laing among his associates; Laing gave Leary his first shot of heroin in Trocchi’s house. He met Bateson, another important collaborator who also acquired counter-cultural status, in the U.S.