This book is a shorter and more popular version of my 1999 book, The Divided Self of William James. To achieve this I had to cut out all references to the vast secondary source literature and greatly simplify my discussion by omitting most of the technical parts of the book, such as would be accessible only to professional philosophers. I thank Terence Moore for initially suggesting this project and helping me as I proceeded, especially for checking my natural proclivity to be overly technical and rigorous, that is, boring.

The William James that I present is my William James. Any interpretation of James that purports to be the correct one thereby shows itself not to be. For James sought a maximally rich and suggestive philosophy, one in which everyone could see themselves reflected, being like a vast ocean out of which each could haul whatever is wanted, provided the right-sized net is used. But there isn't any one net that is the right-sized one. When a philosopher aims for maximum richness and suggestiveness it will result in numerous surface tensions and inconsistencies in the text. This gives great leeway to interpreters, which is just what James wanted, because it forces them to philosophize on their own. Too often sympathetic interpreters attempt to protect a great philosopher against his hostile critics by watering down his philosophy so that it winds up agreeing with our common-sense beliefs.