THE CAREER NOVELIST
artists who were members of the Royal Academy, playwrights who
had won the London Critics' Award, and poets who had received the
Queen's Gold Medal.
Episodes of intense creativity may also be partly attributed to
manic depression, according to that same study. Curiously, people
in a mildly manic state think more quickly, fluidly, and originally. In
a depressed state people are more self-critical and obsessive. That
makes manic-depressive syndrome a seductive illness for writers:
when you need to write, just get manic. Need to revise? Get good
and depressed.
Depression and suicide are even more serious plagues upon the
writing profession. It is horrifying to contemplate the talent we have
lost. Sylvia Plath. Anne Sexton. Ernest Hemingway.
William Styron has chronicled his struggle with depression in his
book Darkness Visible. With regard to the specific disorders manic-
depressive syndrome or depressive illness, writers are ten to twen-
ty times more likely to suffer them than the general population,
according to an American study.
Extremely serious problems—and hauntingly beautiful writing—
can result when authors make their illness their subject. Sylvia
Plath, John Berryman, and Robert Lowell all did that. Suicide can
sometimes become an attractive theme, too, especially when it
seems like a possible resolution of one's own life story.
If you are addicted, depressed, manic-depressive, or have
thoughts of suicide, please get help. Your life is precious. I also
believe that nothing so easily treated as an addiction or a mental
disorder is worth the sacrifice of a writing career. Please stay with
us. We need you.