Strong Imagination: Madness, Creativity and Human Nature

Rating:
Summary: grasping at non-existent justifications...
Review: I respect the author's intentions to provide a form of consolation for troubled individuals like myself. However, the attempt falls short in the too-real context of inevitable aging and death. Assuming that personal efficacy in ordinary matters is self-evidently a cure simply loses sight of the fact that concentrating on mundane matters must be conducted without any form of external justification.

I recommend readers interested in this subject turn to different techniques of being resigned to the purposelessness and meaninglessness that scientific investigations continually reveal. In particular, I recommend the scientifically grounded "cosmic spirituality" as described by Milton Munitz in books such as The Question of Reality; Cosmic Understanding and Does Life Have A Meaning?. Owen Flanagan also provides comfort in his discussions, including The Problem of the Soul.

Having to face reality is always a difficult task. And Daniel Nettle courageously takes up this task with all good intention to alert troubled individuals to NOT indulge in nihilistic self-destruction for the sake of "art" or other means to attention and notoriety. This is sound advice. As is Nettle's advice to pursue robust health. These are all necessary but ultimately insufficient steps on the way to a comfortable avoidance of insanity. For a self-sufficient presence, one still must face one's personal orientation to the totality of reality.

The over-arching issue remains the absence of external justification of one's actions and one's presence. And for this there is no simple fix. Making oneself at home in the universe remains an extremely elusive destination...

Rating:
Summary: Bring your brain
Review: I'm a writer with manic depression who is bothered by the way mental illness is romanticized within the writing community. So many people I know believe that writers with manic depression should not take medication because it will "kill" their creativity. I find this attitude really offensive -- not just because it is false -- but also because it puts manic-depressive writers and artists in danger. I have found very few resources that adequately address this issue, very few books that explain why allowing full blown psychosis to developed is a bad idea, not just for the health of the person in question, but for his or her creativity as well. Daniel Nettle really hit this one it on the head as far as I'm concerned.

I was particularly drawn into the parts of the book that dealt with the "nature vs. nuture" argument, and the history behind each way of thinking. This information is complex but assessable. I read the book in just a few sittings.

Don't get me wrong -- this is no dumbed down self-help book. This is a heady and academic work, full of carefully thought out arguments. Bring your brain and a lot of sticky arrows to mark your favorite passages. My book is now full of them.