More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
Bri says it this way: “I think that when we’re talking about … schizophrenia, we really want to be clear about what is rational, two plus two equals four; what is irrational, two plus two equals spaghetti sauce; and what is nonrational…. A lot of people who are diagnosed with schizophrenia that I have spoken with, that I have worked with … are not irrational at all.” The divine is nonrational and indicates the limits of symbolic understanding; insanity is irrational and indicates a structural failure of reality.
She judges psychosis by its utility: “If there’s something of use there, then you take it. And so even if it’s a scary vision, if there’s something of use there that you can take and you can apply to your life, I wouldn’t consider that schizophrenic. I would consider that liminal.” Our world values what is rational, and fears what is irrational: the raving homeless man on the morning bus; the murderous, delusional “psychos” we see on Law & Order—law and order being, after all, the ultimate institutions of rationality and reason. To understand the nonrational takes looking beyond the surface,
...more
the sacred arts have given me some solace not so much through the beliefs they provide as through the actions they recommend. To say this prayer—burn this candle—perform this ritual—create this salt or honey jar—is to have something to do when it seems that nothing can be done.
My last serious episode of delusional thinking is four years behind me. But there are the episodes that foretell psychosis, or even mild psychosis—the episodes in which I must tread carefully to keep myself where I am. When a certain kind of psychic detachment occurs, I retrieve my ribbon; I tie it around my ankle. I tell myself that should delusion come to call, or hallucinations crowd my senses again, I might be able to wrangle sense out of the senseless. I tell myself that if I must live with a slippery mind, I want to know how to tether it too.
The Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize seeks to acknowledge—and honor—the great traditions of literary nonfiction. Whether grounded in observation, autobiography, or research, much of the most beautiful, daring, and original writing over the past few decades can be categorized as nonfiction.
