Tending the Tree of Life
Wild Sage Press / 26 January 2015

Tending the Tree of Life by Irwin Kahan illustrated by Wendy Winter Published by Wild Sage Press Review by Jessica Bickford $25.00 978-0-9881229-8-7 Tending the Tree of Life is Irwin Kahan’s memoir chronicling his life from growing up on the Saskatchewan prairie, through the second World War, and onto his work trying to improve health care for those suffering from mental illness. I learned so much from Irwin’s story – from the struggles of pioneering while attempting to keep the Jewish faith, to the difficulties of trying to finish high school by correspondence lessons, and even to what it’s like to take LSD (for science, of course). Irwin’s optimism is clear throughout his story.  Despite the obvious hardships he and his family faced, not only with rampant anti-semitism, but simply surviving the harsh farming conditions of the prairies and then the horrors of World War II, Irwin refuses to complain.  He is endlessly focused on the good – his friends and family and the occasions where he felt he was doing good work to help others. I was so interested to learn about Irwin’s work trying to have mental illness, especially schizophrenia, recognized for what it is – an illness,…