There is today unfortunately not enough available literature to meet the needs of the public on the subject of Bipolar disorder and creativity. One such eminent exception to this situation was the excellent literary contribution of Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison, an American Psychiatrist, who in 1993 published "Touched with Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament". In that well-researched and seminal book, Jamison delves into statistical phenomena which links manic depressive illness with a considerably higher population pool of artistic achievers than are found in the general public. In particular, she states that especially among "successful poets" severe forms of this mysterious illness has been a common occurrence in the lives of these individuals.
John Philippe Rushton, the late renown English psychologist was one of the few scientific minds of the last century to study this correlation between Bipolar disorder and creative accomplishment. He found that there exists a definitive link between this life-threatening pathology and the "creative muse". His conclusion was confirmed by Jamison in her research. In Jamison's book she gives us Lord George Byron, the famed English romantic bard, as a classic example of an individual both exceptionally gifted as a poet and equally cursed with what Byron himself termed "a taint of blood".
This particular relationship is not a new discovery. Aristotle noted as early as The Fourth Century B.C. that "madness" and "creative genius" were often well married in the same individuals. Yet why the correlation? Why is it that so many gifted men and women in the realm of the arts have suffered from this disease? A disease which still is for most people often very hard to comprehend the nature of.
My contention after much private research concerning the link between manic depression and creativity, combined with my own personal experience an artist who has suffered from bipolar disorder all of my life is that in order to find the answer, or answers to this question, one must admit to the existence of a spiritual realm that is essentially embedded in the core of every individual's being. In particular, I refer to the human mind, or "psyche" as distinguished from the physical brain, as well as to the spiritual "heart".
Manic Depression attacks the body. True. It is a genetically based illness. True. These are now undisputed facts within the scientific communities of The United States and the rest of the civilized world, especially in the northern and western portions of the globe. Yet since the human individual possesses a spiritual soul as well as a body, the spirit is also gravely affected by virtue of its union with the body. This disease called Bipolar disorder, or "manic depression" as it was once generally termed attacks every aspect of the whole person, not merely one's body.
The diseased individual is now exposed to a psychic and emotional perception far different from everyday stimuli. One must adjust to the "ethereal", the "different" and the "extraordinary", in ecstasy or agony. In the manic phase of the illness it is not uncommon for the sick to see "visions", true or false, to hear music unheard of before. For the emotional extremes which the sufferer lives through due to the wild whims of this most volatile pathology deepens that person's capacity to experience the things of the spiritual world, the fantastic elements of life. That person is propelled on voyages to places rarely spoken of. And with the adjoining agonizing depressions which almost always accompany or follow such "highs", one is exposed to the most horrific hells as well as to the brightest heavens.
In short, these extremities of moods and mental states breed in the poet or other brand of artist, new vistas to paint with words, paint or music; vistas which if it were not for this illness he or she would not have likely been exposed to. Such are my contentions concerning the association of artistic achievement with this terrible illness.
Let it be known that human life is priceless, and that art is not. I therefore encourage further scientific research to eradicate this merciless illness from the face of the earth. For the one sure symptom of this most severe brain disorder is ineffable pain, of a kind no one can articulate. The great loss of life that this horrible disease has already claimed is worth infinity more than all the artistic achievements taken together since the creation of the world.
It is high time that this illness is seen as nothing but a threat to human life, art or no art. The price that is being paid due to the romanticizing of this deadly medical condition is more than tragic and is beyond conception. Let us all hope for a cure, and that right soon.
~ John Lars Zwerenz