Depression - The Darkest Seduction
Depression is seen by doctors and medical researchers the world over as a real illness. But do we really think it is just a disease? Or do we still buy into the romantic idea that creativity is somehow linked to this species of suffering?
What would lead anyone to resist the idea of treatment, when there is ample evidence that depression physically damages the brain? Why are people attracted to depressives – do they mistake unresponsiveness for confidence, or see nobility in despair?
Perhaps depression is the last bastion of the view that there is some aesthetic, moral or intellectual value in experiencing illness rather than being treated.
The tradition of heroic melancholy goes back thousands of years – and in and out of fashion. Melancholy covered a host of sins. It is not only what we call major depression. It probably included everything from bipolar disorder to alcoholism and drugs. There was a particular interest in the "melancholic malcontent", a nonconforming, seditious young man, a type admired in Italy. So the notion of rebellious artistic genius going hand in hand with depression entered our culture.
Depressed people speak of themselves both as if they were gravely disabled and as if their illness was some mark of superiority. The tendency to attach value to depression is common enough. Depression can appear to embody an aesthetic, moral or even political stance. There is a left-wing viewpoint in which it represents moral distance from society: minimalism versus mercantilism. There is also a right-wing perspective: the view that one should tough out the suffering without resorting to easy remedies like psychotherapeutic support or medication. Both sides see virtue in experiencing illness rather than seeking treatment.
Depression can be seductive. One example is men who find themselves attracted to women with depression. A woman whom it is hard for them to attract, hard to arouse, one who is withdrawn and unresponsive to them, appears to have a kind of social confidence, the ability to resist men's wiles. And it is not only women. The brooding, unreachable young man, the rebel without a cause – what woman can resist his dark appeal?
Most of the early studies that link mental illness with creative genius looked at schizophrenia and the paranoia associated with it. Recently, some studies have found a possible link between creativity and manic depression – but people who are prone to mania often accomplish lots of things, not just in the arts.
Maybe the notion that depression is linked to creativity is related to the idea that depression is a lot like passion. I like to think that extreme experience informs art and makes a tale interesting; that there may be new realizations that arise from sadness. However at the end of the day, the emptiness, paralysis and terror of depression have only a modest connection to the sadness of everyday life.
In retrospect, maybe depression is nothing more than narrow, flattened emotions. It is very hard to see any actual benefits of depression. If there were, why isn't everyone depressed? Evolutionary biologists argue that the advantage could be that it forces you to stop and drop what you are doing. Yet sometimes depressives carry on with what they are doing, making terrible decisions and sticking to the wrong things.
*i don't think i'm depressed... but i like to think that i am...
What would lead anyone to resist the idea of treatment, when there is ample evidence that depression physically damages the brain? Why are people attracted to depressives – do they mistake unresponsiveness for confidence, or see nobility in despair?
Perhaps depression is the last bastion of the view that there is some aesthetic, moral or intellectual value in experiencing illness rather than being treated.
The tradition of heroic melancholy goes back thousands of years – and in and out of fashion. Melancholy covered a host of sins. It is not only what we call major depression. It probably included everything from bipolar disorder to alcoholism and drugs. There was a particular interest in the "melancholic malcontent", a nonconforming, seditious young man, a type admired in Italy. So the notion of rebellious artistic genius going hand in hand with depression entered our culture.
Depressed people speak of themselves both as if they were gravely disabled and as if their illness was some mark of superiority. The tendency to attach value to depression is common enough. Depression can appear to embody an aesthetic, moral or even political stance. There is a left-wing viewpoint in which it represents moral distance from society: minimalism versus mercantilism. There is also a right-wing perspective: the view that one should tough out the suffering without resorting to easy remedies like psychotherapeutic support or medication. Both sides see virtue in experiencing illness rather than seeking treatment.
Depression can be seductive. One example is men who find themselves attracted to women with depression. A woman whom it is hard for them to attract, hard to arouse, one who is withdrawn and unresponsive to them, appears to have a kind of social confidence, the ability to resist men's wiles. And it is not only women. The brooding, unreachable young man, the rebel without a cause – what woman can resist his dark appeal?
Most of the early studies that link mental illness with creative genius looked at schizophrenia and the paranoia associated with it. Recently, some studies have found a possible link between creativity and manic depression – but people who are prone to mania often accomplish lots of things, not just in the arts.
Maybe the notion that depression is linked to creativity is related to the idea that depression is a lot like passion. I like to think that extreme experience informs art and makes a tale interesting; that there may be new realizations that arise from sadness. However at the end of the day, the emptiness, paralysis and terror of depression have only a modest connection to the sadness of everyday life.
In retrospect, maybe depression is nothing more than narrow, flattened emotions. It is very hard to see any actual benefits of depression. If there were, why isn't everyone depressed? Evolutionary biologists argue that the advantage could be that it forces you to stop and drop what you are doing. Yet sometimes depressives carry on with what they are doing, making terrible decisions and sticking to the wrong things.
*i don't think i'm depressed... but i like to think that i am...
posted by babyweed at 3:25 PM
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