The Treatment and the Cure — Peter Kocan

A compelling, perceptive and disturbing account of one man's fight to survive incarceration. After a brief spell in gaol, Len tarbutt, nineteen years old and serving a life sentence, is transferred to the maximum security ward of a mental hospital. In the treatment and its award-winning sequel, the Cure, tarbutt's efforts to survive the system into which he has been thrust, and at the same time preserve his individuality, are movingly and often humorously portrayed by Peter Kocan, himself a survivor of just such a system. First published to critical acclaim in the early 1980's, the treatment and the Cure are works of intensity, maturity, discipline and surprising humour, and offer the reader a rewarding and compelling literary experience. the Cure won the NSW Premier's Award for 1983.