THE CREATIVITY / MENTAL ILLNESS DEBATE

By Kay Redfield Jamison

Some years ago, I theorized — without much more than anecdotal surmise --- that there must be a connection between creativity and mental illness because so many artists, writers, performers, and other creative people have been found to suffer from suicidal depression, self-destructive obsessive addiction, or some other form of “abnormal" behavior. 

A book by by researcher Kay Redfield Jamison titled “Touched With Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament”, 1993, seemed to support the notion.

The author cited several studies which examined the lives of noted creative figures and argued that their experiences strongly suggested a connection between "creativity" and some forms of mental illness, particularly what used to be called "manic-depression." 

She also included in her list of candidates many who lived in the age before what we would consider modern psychiatric diagnoses, but who she deemed to be qualified because their biographers or contemporaries noted serious behaviors now associated with this disorder. Most had spent time in "asylums" or psychiatric hospitals, had tried to or succeeded in killing themselves. 

As evidence, she also offered evidence of their self-analysis in correspondence, fiction, poems, even painting. She concluded that a high percentage of creative writers reported "intense, highly productive and creative episodes," which they themselves described as "manic." Others reported severe mood swings affecting creativity. In sum, the experiences many of these creative people described fit in well with clinical criteria for major mood disorders.  

However, since then, other mental health researchers have taken pains to contradict these findings, pointing to flawed testing, contradictory evidence and exposing the reliance on anecdotal and unreliable observations by contemporaries. 

See for example: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/2013/10/03/the-real-link-between-creativity-and-mental-illness/

The recent deaths of Philip Seymour Hoffman and Robin Williams have reinvigorated the debate with articles quoting experts on both sides. 

Eg: http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2014/08/13/robin-williams-is-there-a-link-between-genius-and-mental-illness/14016255/

My own genius son, Greg, has debunked the romantic notion of “mad genius,” pointing out that creativity demands discipline and concentration, both difficult for the mentally ill person who is in the throes of depression or psychosis, or under the influence of addictive drugs like cocaine, heroin, and the like. 

But I still think of someone like Sylvia Plath. Her poetry, which she certainly worked out with discipline and concentration, was also certainly at least an expression of her depression, which was the central issue of her life for many years and which ultimately killed her. 

Can we really ignore the knowledge that Robin Williams was a self-described self-medicating sufferer of bi-polar disorder when we watch his “manic” improvisational brilliantly observed raps. 

He was surely an artist who carefully honed his craft on many stages. He was born with an extraordinary gift, which he used to express his need for love and approval from audiences. He studied at Julliard and exhibited a sharp intellect. He worked hard for the laughs and the strong feelings he earned from his audiences. 

This is not to argue that mental illness is needed for creativity. 

It does not suggest that suffering from mental illness qualifies as a criteria for creativity. The ramblings or scribbling of severely ill people are most often sadly incoherent products of troubled minds, not defined as art except by the broadest standard. 

Neither does it rebut the truth that mental illness is far more often a hindrance to the productivity of the artist. 

It remains to be proven whether, as some artists believe, if deprived of their demons, whether by medication or therapy or something else, they will lose their gift.   

Certainly there are many artists who would not fit into a definition of any mental illness. Probably, most are merely nuts — like the rest of us. 

Conversation With A Finch

Long before there was such a thing as a blog, I kept a journal. Not every day, not even every month or every year, but I’ve been doing it now and then, off and on since junior high school.

Recently, I found this entry.

July 6, 1988.
Last weekend I relaxed, doing so with a tense determination that is so characteristic of my attempts at relaxation. The few moments I was able to loosen up were attributable to a finch. Or a sparrow, some kind of common little bird. He forced me to relax. I think it is impossible not to relax when having a conversation with a little bird.

I had slipped out to the patio early Sunday morning, while Greg was watching wrestling and Bijou was doing the Times crossword. The sun was beginning to burn the moisture from the gray morning overcast. By noon there would be just enough smog to filter the color from the sky.

I was getting some time on the new patio chairs — we bought the ones from France, $1,000 worth of plastic, but stylish plastic, and I had to admit, comfortable plastic — at least when I had the chance, as now, to steal a few moments to sit on one of them. I had adjusted it to one of its four hundred and twelve positions, settled in and put the coffee mug on a napkin on the plastic table when I noticed the sparrows or finches or whatever they were. I’ll call them finches because it types faster.

They were flittering about the yard, about six of them as near as I could count as they swooped and perched, darted from tree to roof to fence. I also noticed a mockingbird back there and a crow that thrashed clumsily in the top of the palm in Al’s yard next door.

There were no airplanes, no helicopters yet. We were near the flightpaths of most of the airports in L.A. County, a feature of the property that the realtor had neglected to emphasize, but the winds must have been wrong because this morning the windows did not rattle even once.

I was sitting, thinking about the cost of the patio furniture, looking out at the yard, estimating the next expense, fixing the coping of the pool, musing how the new wooden back fence already needed another coat of waterproofing and stain, when the finch hopped over and perched on the wrought iron fence that enclosed the patio.

It was a male, I guessed from his fluffy little red breast. He was about ten feet from me and I kept very still. He stared at me a moment, cocking his head in that jerky way birds have. I could see he was nervous about my presence, but he was gamely hanging in there. He whistled, and soon another finch, a brown-gray one, hopped over to the patio just outside the fence. She — I assumed this was a female because she was so drab — looked up at the male and chirped. He didn’t look back, but he responded with a few whistles, and he hopped up to the spider plant.

The spider plant was on a a ledge within the patio area, a few feet closer to me, but a bit higher than the top of the fence. From there, he looked at me again, then at the baker’s rack that held twenty or so potted cactus and succulents. That’s when I realized what was happening. Last Spring a mockingbird couple had built a nest in a bush near the breakfast room. At the same time, a dove couple had squatted in on of my onion plants on the ledge on the wall opposite the spider plant.

We had watched the progress of the two nurturing families. Each had hatched their offspring: three noisy yellow beaked mockingbabies, and one very quiet, well-behaved dovebaby. A vagrant white tomcat had murdered the mockingbabies in their beds one night just for kicks. I had found their ravaged little bodies in various parts of the yard one morning. The dovebaby had matured and flew away, leaving me with a massive clean-up for my onion plant.

The drama had been traumatic for Bijou. She had first seen the saga as a “learning experience” for Greg. She had read books about the mating and nesting habits, from which she had recited each morning at breakfast. Greg, of course, was underenthused; it was too much like first grade. When the tragedy occurred, Bijou was quite shaken. She grieved for weeks. Greg was riveted by the gruesome details.

When I noticed the twigs this Spring in the wandering Jew on the baker’s rack, I immediately dumped them and moved the plant to a low shelf. Recently, I had moved it back to the top, where there was more sunlight. I now realized that the new nest had been the finches’ project. They had returned now to try to rebuild their property.

The little fellow was perched on the spider plant, spurred by his nagging mate, peering at the purple wandering Jew, at me, back to the inviting plant-home. He was as close to me as he dared come. The plant was a few feet from the $200 chair I was using as a foot rest. The wife chirped at him. He chirped back, telling her that he dared not come closer while I was there. She insisted. He implored me, cocking his head and whistling.

Bijou appeared at the patio door and both birds flew away.

Later, when she had gone, the fellow returned, alone this time. He sat on the wrought iron fence and whistled to me. I knew what was happening. He was apologizing, man to man, for invading my privacy and for being so pushy. I knew what I had to do. I puckered my lips and whistled, sucking in air, trying to imitate his song. At first, he seemed startled by this, but he held his ground and whistled back. That’‘s when we talked.

“Look,” I said. “I sympathize with you. I’m married too.”
“Yeah, he said, blinking. “I saw. I like her red hair.”
“Me too,” I said. “Your wife’s nice, too.”
“She’s okay.”
“But I can’t let you nest in my plant.”
“It’s cool,” he said.
“It was too traumatic, the last time. I won’t go into a long story, but ...”
“Hey, you don’t have to explain. It’s your plant.”
“And there’s the bugs that come along, these tiny flies.”
“I know.”
“And the mess. And it doesn’t do the plant much good.”
“I guess,” he seemed to shrug. “I hadn’t thought about it.” He whistled for emphasis. “Well, I just thought I’d ask. You know, she was pretty set on it.”
“I could tell.” My guilt feelings were obvious.
“Well, forget it,” he said. “It’s not like this is the only tree in the forest. So to speak.”

There was an awkward moment and Greg stormed out to tell me he had nothing to do because mom told him he couldn’t watch wrestling. “She says its too violent, but I told her its not real. Tell her, daddy, its not real and its okay to watch.”

Of course, the finch was gone by then.

I haven’t seen him since and it is pretty late in the Summer I imagine for nesting. But maybe next Spring....