Fire in the Belly: On Being a Man

The new male that Keen envisions is neither devoted careerist nor self-absorbed New Age guy nor cool, detached ``post-modern man.'' He is husbandman and steward of the earth--strong, vulnerable, with a capacity for moral outrage, empathy and wonder--whose right livelihood is consonant with ecological awareness. Consulting editor of Psychology Today , Keen ( Faces of the Enemy ) argues that men must define their identities by severing themselves from women as approval-giving mother figures and as the ancient Goddess who continues to exert power within the male psyche's hidden recesses. Going beyond the modern rites of manhood--alienating work, war, performance-oriented sex--the new male ``psychonaut'' brings forth meaning by undertaking ``a spiritual journey into the self.'' Men--and women--will be enriched by the uncommon insights in Keen's speculative primer. (Mar.)