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Read Darkness Visible: A Memoir Of Madness (1992)

Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness (1992)
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Author
William Styron
Genre
Fiction
Rating
4.04 of 5 Votes: 5
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ISBN
0679736395 (ISBN13: 9780679736394)
Language
English
Publisher
vintage
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Darkness Visible: A Memoir Of Madness (1992) - Plot & Excerpts

3 – 3.5 starsIs there anything worse than feeling like you can’t control your own mind? Can you conceive the helplessness of being able to perceive the lies that your own brain is telling you, but still being unable to escape them? In feeling unequal to the task of avoiding triggers that send you into depths that despite their destructive tendencies seem at times either desirable or necessary, like picking at a fresh wound to morbidly watch it bleed? Is there anything more self-destructive than depression? To be fair I would imagine every illness is primarily terrifying due to the lack of control one has over one’s self, whether it be a purely physical lack of control over a limb or an organ, or even just one’s overall sense of well-being, but I still can’t help feeling that there is a certain unparalleled horror at the thought that one has little to no control over one’s state of mind. Eventually one can wander into a state like a drunken haze, but far from diminishing the emotional anguish one feels it is actually exacerbated. The pointlessness of one’s life becomes a fact, regardless of the ‘true’ reality of the situation and one ends up playing little more than a waiting game with the ultimate destination likely to be either self-inflicted death or, if one is able to wait it out and find the help one needs, eventual recovery. Unfortunately this help is not in any way a known quantity. What may work for some: medication, counselling, just soldiering through the haze, may have no positive effect on others. Add to that the need for external support at the very time that one least desires to be around others coupled to the fact that one’s emotional and mental state is often seen as inexplicable, distasteful, and even ridiculous to people looking in from the outside and it’s no wonder that recovery from depression is a hard fought battle that often ends in tragic failure. William Styron, the author of Sophie's Choice and The Confessions of Nat Turner, covers many of these issues in regards to his own bout of severe clinical depression in his memoir _Darkness Visible_. He recalls key moments in the disease’s progression in his life, from the first vague stirrings to the moments of crisis when he knew he was dealing with a life-threatening disease. He details the strange regularity that became a part of his life while he was held in the grip depression, the cycles of limited clarity and soul crushing pain that compartmentalized the moments of his day. He details the near epic failure of his physician to deal with the disease through an apparent inability to grasp the reality of what Styron was experiencing, a problem for all outsiders to the disease, along with ineffective, or downright irresponsible, medication until the final moment of crisis when he was hospitalized and finally found the help he needed to recover. He also provides anecdotes of other sufferers from the world of literature, some of whom he knew personally, others who were only heroes, to give some sense of the widespread nature of the disease as well as the myriad of ways in which it afflicts individuals.It is notoriously difficult to really explain the experience of depression to those who have not experienced it without resorting to generalities and platitudes, thus making Styron’s job harder. Also, as he notes, it tends to be such a particular illness tailored to each of its victims in a manner as unique as that person’s own history and psyche that any attempt to universalize it or draw any but the most superficial generalizations about the disease is probably bound to fail. Despite this though there are certainly touchstones of commonality for all of its sufferers. Amongst these are the morbid fantasies of suicide, generally misunderstood by external observers, but which “are to the deeply depressed mind what lascivious daydreams are to persons of robust sexuality.” Added to this are the features of self-hatred, an utter lack of belief in one’s self-worth, and an intense sense of loss, whether it be actual or imagined, that each compound the sufferer’s sense that there really is no point to anything anymore regardless of what others might say to them. In early stages the sufferer has to try and pretend that they are still capable of engaging in normal human interaction such as Styron recounts when he was forced to attend a dinner party with friends: “There he must, despite the anguish devouring his brain, present a face approximating the one that is associated with ordinary events and companionship.”Styron has a lot to say about the then-current state of knowledge and understanding of the disease in the medical and scientific community and while he does try to be even-handed it seems pretty obvious that he had a rather jaundiced view of the medical community’s ability to deal effectively with the disease, or even to understand it. For the most part it often appears as though most practitioners are led by guesswork (as well as the ‘party line’ of whatever school of thought to which they adhere in the psychiatric community) as much as real knowledge and almost seem to view the entire arena as something of a theoretical thought experiment: “The psychiatric literature on depression is enormous, with theory after theory concerning the disease’s etiology proliferating as richly as theories about the death of dinosaurs or the origin of black holes.” Ultimately these theories on depression seem, for the sufferer at least, to be as purely speculative and useful as any of those put forward for the more esoteric fields mentioned. It also seems that there is no escaping the disease given that much of it appears to be derived from a person’s genetics as much as their early experiences and so for Styron: “Thus depression, when it finally came to me, was in fact no stranger, not even a visitor totally unannounced: it had been tapping at my door for decades.”I couldn’t say I enjoyed this memoir, but I did appreciate its candour and honesty in the face of a disease still generally treated with fear and misunderstanding by the world at large. Blaming the victim is not an uncommon event in many aspects of human life, but it seems to gain a level of tragic poignancy in these cases where a person’s own mind seems to betray them.

I picked read this as I'm always interested in peoples' experiences with depression and how they deal with it/emerge from it, as well as how it was for them. I think sometimes I'm depressed but having read this book I think what I have might simply be the occasional blues. William Styron makes this distinction clear in his memoir "Darkness Visible" where he says that full on depression (a term he deplores as too weak a description - he prefers the label "brainstorm") totally cripples a person. They're unable to do anything, can't get through a day, and contemplating death becomes almost pleasurable as it's an escape from their condition. I think this was the best thing to come out of reading this book - the understanding between being unhappy with yourself and your life sometimes but still continuing and taking comfort from little things, to being clinically depressed. While a lack of action and a blackness in thought were the things I took from this as being clinically depressed, I never really felt that I understood what it was like to be this way. The best Styron manages is a sort of lethargy that most people can relate to, he can never actually fully articulate the sensation (or lack thereof) of depression (odd as he is a very verbose writer). A lot of the book is taken up with Styron musing on other famous writers who were depressed as well as the treatment of his depression - nothing particularly special, pills, followed by hospitalisation and counselling. Though it's a short book, I felt Styron didn't quite put across the experience of depression very well in the book and I came away from it none the wiser having read it. "Prozac Nation" is a less well written but more enlightening read by someone who's also been through the wringer of mental hell. "Darkness Visible" felt like it was written by someone afraid, or unable, to return back to the depths to dredge up the experience on paper and so produced a weaker book as a result.

What do You think about Darkness Visible: A Memoir Of Madness (1992)?

I reread this after many years, having apparently forgotten how much it sucks. It's not the content so much as Styron's style: pompous, dull, self-satisfied, flat, prosaic. I understand his point: that depression (or as he prefers to call it, being a ponderous hack, "Melancholia") is tedious, that depressed people are insufferable, that it's all very grim and dreary and Extremely Serious! and so forth. I just fail to understand why this reads like the first draft of an amateur journalist. I don't remember his novels being this awful. Even the title is pretentious. The only good thing I have to say about this book is that it's less than a 100 pages long. This made me feel slightly less gypped at the end, when oh, hey, Depression Passes! Especially if you go to a hospital, where you can focus on getting well and cut your crappy food with plastic utensils. I also think his sudden revelation at the end, about how his major depression might have been precipitated by misuse of Halcion, is crap artistry. It sounded to me like he was just trying to impose some kind of coherence on a very meandering trajectory. If he was indeed, as he claimed, a compulsive reader of the Physician's Desk Reference, surely it would have occurred to him before that he was overdoing it with the sleeping aids. He was second-guessing his doctors throughout his illness, so why would he have taken the doctor who prescribed the Halcion at his word? I wasn't rooting for Styron to get better. I didn't even believe he was truly suicidal. I just wanted to scream, "Get over yourself, asshole! You're in motherfucking France, accepting a fancy award they're deluded enough to think you deserve!" or even, to my shame, "Just shut up and off yourself, already!" For the sake of his long-suffering wife, I'm glad he didn't commit suicide, of course, but I don't think he made his darkness visible. He just made a bunch of murky, unbeautiful sentences and annoyed the hell out of me.
—Rene Saller

I don't understand depression as a disease. I know people suffer from it, and that it can be serious enough to lead to hospitalizations or even suicide. Yet, I'll admit I've been dismissive of those in my life who repeatedly claim to be habitually depressed. I often view their behavior as manipulative and attention-seeking. But is that fair? Even after reading this very personal account of life with depression, I'm just not sure. To paraphrase William Styron, depression is an individual experience with symptoms and outcomes specific to the sufferer. Knowing that each unique experience cannot be represented by one man's journey into, through, and beyond a serious bout of depression, I have to admit there were moments as I read that I could see parallels between the author and those I know. He talked a lot about insomnia, paranoia, and fear of abandonment. He talked about how the depression negatively affected his health, even the pitch and timber of his voice. Familiar complaints. Recognizing the shared symptoms, I have to admit I felt some guilt for the dismissive attitude I've had. I also found it interesting that he talked about medications and their negative impact on his depressive state. The prescriptions meant to help him battle the insomnia worsened his condition exponentially, a realization that came only after a change in medication. I want to share this with the sufferers I know, but I imagine this tidbit will not be well-received.I'm hoping that having read this book will help me be a more sympathetic listener. I can't fix the problems of those I know, but I can work on my reaction to their ailments, real and perceived.
—Krista

NATURAL BURELLATag words:Albert Camus, Romain Gary, Jean Seberg, Parigi, Lo straniero, Vanity Fair, Hotel Washington, Prix Mondial Cino Del Duca, 25.000 dollari americani, Abbie Hoffman, Un letto di tenebre, Randall Jarrell, Primo Levi, Halcion, Ludiomil, benzodiazepina, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association, Concorde (l’aereo), Gallimard, plateau de fruits de mer, Le confessioni di Nat Turner, Mersault, Emma Bovary, Considerazioni sulla ghigliottina, Sisifo, La caduta, Martha’s Vineyard, New York, Connecticut, Brasserie Lipp, La Coupole, Prix Goncourt, New York Review of Books, Chapel Hill, New York Times, Chaucer, 1303, 1952, 1960, 1965, 1967, 1968, 1970, 1978, 1980, 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989, American Hospital di Neuilly, Académie Française, William James, Varie forme dell’esperienza religiosa, Baudelaire, l’ala della follia mi ha sfiorato, Majakovskij, Adolf Meyer, Newsweek, Times, 150 fenilbarbiturici, alcol, Auschwitz, L’autodistruzione nella terra promessa, teoria del lutto incompleto, malinconia, depressione, tempesta mentale, fantasie atroci, angoscia, sofferenza, annegamento, soffocamento, tormento, terrorizzato, indifeso, tremante, patologia, pazzia, processo biochimico aberrante, neurotrasmettitori cerebrali, stress sistemico, deplezione di noradrenalina e serotonina, cortisolo, disperazione, desolazione, suicidio, unico rimedio, annullamento dell’animaE quindi uscimmo a riveder le stelle
—orsodimondo

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