The Loony-Bin Trip

Rating:
Summary: A great book I disagreed with
Review: As a person with manic depression, I can identify with some of the things Kate Millett had to say. However, I found her attitude about mental illness rather annoying. In this book, it is clear that she finds a diagnosis of manic depression infuriating and shameful. She finds lithium, a drug that has saved countless lives, to be nothing short of political oppression. She ends by saying that the illness does not really exist.

I cut Millett some slack because the book was written in the 80s and our society had not yet crossed over from Freudian thinking into brain science (we are still making that journey). I'm wondering if she has changed her mind at all in the years since the publication of the book. I, myself, am not ashamed or infuriated by my diagnosis in the way Millett was. I insist on my right to proper treatment, where she felt wronged by the notion of treatment at all.

While I did not agree with most of what Millett had to say, this book is captivating. She is clearly a brilliant woman and a fantastic writer.


Rating:
Summary: Fascinating but wordy and pretentious
Review: I read this book primarily for some insights into the excesses of psychiatry, and found much of that. I was quite surprised how strongly I identified with some of her feelings. Though I have have never had problems of the sort Kate had (has?), I am one of the many who have experienced clinical depression and been treated for it. As I read her book, I noticed how even this minor problem carries a lifetime of suspicion from others. As I go through life, physicians and relatives are quite ready and willing to jump on ordinary feelings as "evidence" that it is happening again, and maybe there is more to it. How oddly must one behave to start the spiral down to the point of something like Kate's experience happening?

Though I felt that Kate really should have known better than to do some of what she did, knowing that others were likely to use them excuses to have her committed, I still felt deeply her fear and helplessness. I was especially disgusted by the attitude of the shrink who failed to get her hauled away in the Bowry only through Kate's quick thinking.

The minuses of this book for me were the many times the she goes into descriptions of artists and other creative types in such exalted terms. Kate left little doubt that, to her, anyone who does other things with their lives are empty shells who rely on the chosen ones (such as herself) to be able to see the world as it truly is. This sort of elitism (how many times does she tell us she is a professor and published writer) and condescension is sickening in someone who spends so much of her life trying to right great wrongs of society.

Rating:
Summary: Maybe it's the place I'm in
Review: Millet carefully unpacks the historical events surrounding her "breakdowns." Her family and many friends think she is crazy to buy a farm and turn it into an artist's retreat. As readers, it's hard to know whether she did or didn't have a breakdown. However, regardless of whether it even can be determined in such a black-and-white manner, we feel an incredible empathy for her as she welcomes us to experience her hurt, her feelings of jealousy and loss, and her moments of profound joy. For anyone who has ever been diagnosed with a mental "disorder," this is a wonderfully affirming book.

Rating:
Summary: Maybe it's the place I'm in
Review: Millet carefully unpacks the historical events surrounding her "breakdowns." Her family and many friends think she is crazy to buy a farm and turn it into an artist's retreat. As readers, it's hard to know whether she did or didn't have a breakdown. However, regardless of whether it even can be determined in such a black-and-white manner, we feel an incredible empathy for her as she welcomes us to experience her hurt, her feelings of jealousy and loss, and her moments of profound joy. For anyone who has ever been diagnosed with a mental "disorder," this is a wonderfully affirming book.

Rating:
Summary: The Loony Bin Trip
Review: Written between 1982 and 1985, The Loony-Bin Trip is overwhelmingly an effort to revert common notions of depression so that, like "grief," it may be allowed to enter the popular vocabulary. Millet achieves her foremost intent through her undeniably exquisite prose supplanted by already-changing attitudes toward depression among the public. However, The Loony Bin Trip is much more than a diatribe against prevailing stigmas of depression - it is a tender account of a talented, intelligent women's relentless desire to be accepted and understood by her contemporaries. Traumatic accounts and vivid self-reflection can occasionally prompt the most neutral reader into turmoil, thus rendering The Loony Bin Trip a cross-reference somewhere between memoir and horror. Her gut wrenching appeals for sympathy may provoke anger in some readers, reinforcing her real-life role as that of a "crazy" woman, but ultimately, her wealth of writings prove her to be a functional, if not creatively contributing, member of society. Reading Kate Millet's The Loony Bin Trip is a trip in itself. (Review written for Women's Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal," a publication of the Claremont Colleges.

Rating:
Summary: The Loony Bin Trip
Review: Written between 1982 and 1985, The Loony-Bin Trip is overwhelmingly an effort to revert common notions of depression so that, like "grief," it may be allowed to enter the popular vocabulary. Millet achieves her foremost intent through her undeniably exquisite prose supplanted by already-changing attitudes toward depression among the public. However, The Loony Bin Trip is much more than a diatribe against prevailing stigmas of depression - it is a tender account of a talented, intelligent women's relentless desire to be accepted and understood by her contemporaries. Traumatic accounts and vivid self-reflection can occasionally prompt the most neutral reader into turmoil, thus rendering The Loony Bin Trip a cross-reference somewhere between memoir and horror. Her gut wrenching appeals for sympathy may provoke anger in some readers, reinforcing her real-life role as that of a "crazy" woman, but ultimately, her wealth of writings prove her to be a functional, if not creatively contributing, member of society. Reading Kate Millet's The Loony Bin Trip is a trip in itself. (Review written for Women's Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal," a publication of the Claremont Colleges.