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A Psychological View of the Mad Poet

出版	T. Mrak, 2015
URL	http://books.google.com.hk/books?id=QgYOswEACAAJ&hl=&source=gbs_api

註釋This thesis aims to establish a solid link between mental illness and poetic creativity and explain the reasoning behind the time-honoured stereotype of the 'Mad Poet'. Since many studies have pointed to a plausible correlation between creativity and madness, the main focus of the thesis is to provide an explanation for such a link, based on research within the fields of psychology and neurology and autobiographical accounts of poets. The first section attempts to provide an overview of the nature of creativity as defined by contemporary psychologists. It takes into account the process of creation, the creative person and the product, in order to provide a basis for the understanding of its connection to mental illness. A chapter on madness and creativity then zeroes in on poets and madness providing surprising findings from recent studies and research. The final part of the study briefly touches upon neuroimaging, the most recent and empirical source of information when looking for ways to justify a causal link between mental illness and creativity. The thesis concludes that there is a pronounced prevalence of mood disorders, such as bipolar disorder and depression among writers and poets in general. Female poets are the most likely to be troubled by mental illness. The relationship between creativity and some types of mental illness is not only familial, but also genetic, particularly schizophrenia, which is passed on to relatives in the form of either schizotypal traits or creativity. Neuroimaging studies have shown that creative processes and some forms of mental illness operate in the same part of the brain, i.e. the pre-frontal cortex, leading to the idea that the link may well be a causal one.