Manic Depression and Creativity [Paperback]

D. Jablow Hershman (Author), Julian Lieb (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1998

Many recognized geniuses had creative capacities that were driven by bouts of manic intensity followed by the depths of mind-numbing despair. From Plato, who originated the idea of inspired mania, to Beethoven, Dickens, Newton, Van Gogh, and today's popular creative artists and scientists who've battled manic depression, this intriguing work examines creativity and madness in mystery, myth, and history. Demonstrating how manic depression often becomes the essential difference between talent and genius, Hershman and Lieb offer valuable insights into the many obstacles and problems this illness poses for highly creative people. Lieb critiques the wave of new books on depression as well as those on creativity to determine how far we have come in our understanding of this complex illness. The authors also explode the myth that suffering is essential to creativity. Guides for the manic depressive are suggested to reduce emotional pain and personal problems while increasing productivity.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This splendidly written book has a brisk flow and is clearly organised to be enjoyable and informative." -- American Journal of Psychiatry

Product Details

• Paperback: 230 pages
• Publisher: Prometheus Books; 1 edition (August 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1573922412
• ISBN-13: 978-1573922418
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.3 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #366,031 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

49 of 64 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointed, November 17, 2004

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Twilly - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Manic Depression and Creativity (Paperback)

As a person with manic depression, I found this book lacking tact. Why refer to the person in question as a "maniac"? Why always refer to the person in question as "he" -- except for the one time the authors pointed out that female "maniacs" often erroneously believe that men are in love with them. (Well! I never! I'll have you know that men ARE in love with me.) It was as if the authors assumed that no person with the illness would actually pick up the book and read it. I felt the whole time as if I were eavesdropping on a conversation about people like me but from which people like me were excluded. (I also found it striking that although the authors chose 4 great men to write about, the cover of the book has on it a sad and scary-looking crazy woman.)

I might have excused all that if the information had been valuable (it was quite old hat) or if the prose had been particularly eloquent (it wasn't) or if there had been anything really interesting about the book. I ordered it hoping to add to my own understanding of my creativity. I was disappointed.

There are much better books on this subject. Check out Kay Redfield Jamison's Touched With Fire.

39 of 53 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Rename, September 5, 2000

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sil - See all my reviews

This review is from: Manic Depression and Creativity (Paperback)

I read this book as a hard cover when it was aptly named The Key to Genius Manic Depression and the Creative Life. I found it very informative and well written in layman's terms. In the end one learns that nothing comes easy and with out a price even for the best of them. Hershman delivers them as artists and Lieb dissects them as a scientist. I did earn this, genius is a funny thing. In the beginning you think it's crazy as time passes and evolution sets in, you realize that we just did not have the ability to comprehend at the time. As the Cliche goes "genius is never realized in its own time". For those who have delusions of how great it would be to be a genius be prepared to be disillusioned. You feel for these people and the suffering they had endured to bring us their work that we so love. It leaves one humbled. All in all "WOW" an enlightening read.

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Biographical Conjecture, June 11, 2004

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M. Atkinson (Bakersfield, CA (new orleans)USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Manic Depression and Creativity (Paperback)

This book is an essential building block in understanding artistic temperment and the fomentation of (recognized) genius. The authors have eschewed egalitarian premises and psychoanalytical posturing to bring the reader as unbiased a viewpoint as possible while still offering correlations between typical mood affectivity and the amusing/confusing personalities of these four luminaries.

After reading this book, my interest in the subjects, both of these specific historical characters and of the psychiatric relationship of genius to mood disorder, was most assuredly heightened. I'd qualify this book as appropriate for any level of scholarship. It's entertaining, informative and contains some profoundly original thoughts, which is always a pleasure to encounter.

My one great criticism of the book is based on the Dr.'s wholesale endorsement of psychotropic drug therapy which I find to be a little professionally self-serving coming from a profession mired in misdiagnoses that labors under gross inaccuracies at the academic research publish-or-perish journal level and, in their compounded professional ignorance, they rely on patently dangerous drug-based therapies as all-encompassing Panaceas, which they are not.