Literary Leaves

A Schizophrenic on Artaud (Paperback)

2012-02-03T12:51:00.002+11:00

I am pleased to announce that the paperback of my new book A Schizophrenic on Artaud has now been released. Artaud, writing in the early to mid parts of the 20th century in France, had great impact on the cultural meileu of the time. He suffered from schizophrenia which was to make his life fraught with difficulties. He was in about 20 silent films, but truly made his mark through his writing. His work The Theatre and its Double was to gain him a substantial readership.

My work is a poetic reflection in Artaud's life and work. I used my own insight into my schizophrenia to shape the book. It reads in poetic prose, and also explores the literature of the French epoch of that time, as well as other points in history and other literatures of other countries.

The book is published by Chipmunkapublishing, and is available through Amazon.

You can buy a copy here at the Amazon site.

Hope you enjoy it!

A Schizophrenic on Artaud (Kindle Edition)

2011-12-16T11:53:00.005+11:00

My new book, A Schizophrenic on Artaud, has now been released in the Kindle format. For me it was fascinating journey to write the book, exploring my own condition while delving into Artaud's work, and our shared interest in literature. Artaud lived at a time when to suffer from schizophrenia was much harder than it is today. His work shocks, and it also comforts. The amazing linguistic flexibility he had was a really credit to his genius. He stands as an example of what can be achieved despite very trying conditions.

You may buy my book through Amazon here, and download to your Kindle or iPad.

Hope you enjoy the book!

A Schizophrenic on Artaud

2011-11-25T11:27:00.003+11:00

My new book has been released! It is a poetic exploration of the life and work of the French writer Antonin Artaud. Artaud suffered from schizophrenia, but was still able to produce a number of seminal books, including The Theatre and its Double. His work is now considered to have entered the cannon of French letters. His life was one of the highest degrees of suffering. His condition led him to situations that are almost unknown today. My book, A Schizophrenic on Artaud, is written by a fellow sufferer who wanted to bring a self reflexive insight to create a work that would be in the spirit of Artaud's writing. My publisher, Chipmunkapublishing, has released the book initially as an ebook, with the paperback to follow. My ebook is available here for purchase!

Reflections on Artaud

2011-11-18T11:16:00.002+11:00

Artaud has always fascinated me. Writing in the first half of the twentieth century, Artaud was to captivate the literary milieu of his time. His schizophrenia was at its worst during the German occupation of France, when he was institutionalised. The appalling suffering of this time was alleviated to an extent when a doctor running a clinic in the free zone heard of Artaud's plight and had him transferred. Artaud's best known text, The Theatre and its Double, was a poetic and indeed great exploration of theatre practices, and has come to be seminal in the performance of theatre around the world. My book on Artaud, entitled A Schizophrenic on Artaud, interweaves aspects of his life and work in a poetic rendering that does justice to the spirit Artaud wrote in. My publisher, Chipmunkapublishing, has just released the ebook. Stayed tuned to this blog for further details.

August Strindberg (B)

2011-10-07T10:22:00.002+11:00

August Strindberg came to my attention a few years ago at an academic philosophy conference. I was giving a paper on Vaslav Nijinsky, the dancer, who suffered from schizophrenia, and who kept a diary during his initial onset. My own diary, Diary of a Schizophrenic, kept during the onset of my condition 12 years ago, has been published by Chipmunkapublishing in the UK, and was launched last year at the Melbourne Writers Festival. But at the paper, there was an academic there who asked if I had heard of August Strindberg. Strindberg had written a book called Inferno, based on a diary he kept. Strindberg was at this time a famous playwright, but turned from his literary pursuits to pursue chemistry. The book Inferno details a descent into what seems to be a psychotic way of thinking and behaving, and provides a great wealth of material for those wishing to study literary expressions of schizophrenia. There are some who argue that Strindberg accentuated his condition for literary reasons, but I intend to explore this issue, arguing that Strindberg was indeed a sufferer, though not as refractory as many who have been unfortunate enough to endure the strictures of this horrible condition.

2011 Launch Party for the Melbourne Writers Festival

2011-08-30T09:13:00.003+10:00

On Saturday evening, my wife and I attended the launch party for the 2011 Melbourne Writers Festival. This was special for me. It marks a year since the launch of my book, Diary of a Schizophrenic, at the festival last year. A lot has happened in this year. I have written another book, and have become very excited about where my writing is taking me. We both feel like writers now, my wife and I, and this life direction is giving us both a sense of new found enjoyment.

The launch party was quite full, with lots of new and budding authors all eager to make their mark. Their was some very good hair, as all writers festivals should have. But there was a real and palpable sense of what is possible through the written word. Let's hope we never lose that.

Diary of a Schizophrenic (B)

2011-04-07T10:28:00.002+10:00

I had a chance recently to look over my book, Diary of a Schizophrenic, and reflect a little on its content. Now that the dust has settled since the launch of the book at the Melbourne Writers Festival, I am really proud of what the book has achieved. It was my hope that the book would raise awareness of schizophrenia, and to help people to see that the condition does not have to be one of overwhelming despair. Things can be accomplished despite the condition, and a life can be led that is full. The book touches on some fairly personal material, but in a way that, I feel, gives a positive spin on what would otherwise be a very difficult time. Its concern with art, literature and philosophy helps to ground the work, and give it (I believe) some real literary merit. It was a leap of faith to send the manuscript to the publisher, as I was at the time still doing my PhD (which I have now completed). I feel this leap has been worth the while.

The book is now being sold (amongst many other places) through the Angus and Robertson website, which is a real thrill for me, for I would go this chain of bookstores when I was young, and dream of being a writer. I wish for the work that it will give some hope, but also be just an interesting and indeed enjoyable read.

Jorge Luis Borges

2011-03-17T11:31:00.003+11:00

The poetry of Jorge Luis Borges has always held a deep fascination for me. A favourite concept of mine, the oneiric (or the dream like) aptly sums up Borges poetic output. Borges wrote many works of varied style and form, from prose to essays to reviews, but his poetry best depicts this mode of expression. Borges, who went blind later in his life, used this period of visionary darkness to focus on his poetry to great effect.

A very important turning point of Borges' early life came when he was given access to his grandfathers very large library. He mentions this as a crucial stage in his fledging literary development. My own father, when I was quite young, said to me I could buy any book I liked, and he would pay for it. These events can be crucial.

Borges executed a number of literary hoaxes and forgeries in his time. He wrote original works and claimed they were works he had chanced upon, and passed them off in this fashion. He also wrote reviews for non-existent works.

Borges was never awarded to the Nobel Prize for Literature, which always grated upon him. There is some speculation that it was his conservative political views which held him back. But the power of his literary output should not be denied. He is considered one of the great writers of the modern epoch.

Lord Byron

2011-02-17T10:59:00.003+11:00

Byron has been someone who I have always looked towards with a certain and prolonged admiration. His life, indeed his adventurous and non compromising embrace of Life (with a capital L), has been the touchstone for great writers ever since. He was perhaps the first poet to come to real celebrity as we now know it. His various controversies, his adulterous affairs, his love for cousins, his keeping of wild animals (bears, monkeys etc) have entered his name into the annuls of history as an eccentric who knew how to court the public's attention. His death in Greece while fighting for that countries independence sums up the Romantic heart which Byron sought from his time. His epic poem Don Juan (which he had difficulty publishing because of its bawdiness) is considered one of the great epic poems after Milton's Paradise Lost. Without Byron, the Romantic movement would not have had a focal point, and may indeed have been something else altogether. Byron is the typical Romantic hero. Mad, bad and dangerous to know. The phrase started with Byron, and perhaps really ended with him.

William Blake

2011-02-09T13:29:00.003+11:00

I first came across Blake as an undergraduate at university. And there started a passion that has rarely subsided since. Blake, loosely associated (I believe) with the Romantic movement of English letters, is at heart a visionary who defied convention to produce something great. Both a poet and a visual artist, Blake follow his own thinking in almost all of his output. His large epic poems are sprawling works of symbolist energy. His most beautiful works, his shorter poems of Innocence and of Experience, are generally regarded as the pinnacle of English poetry. I had the good fortune, while in Cambridge on a study trip, to visit the Fitzwilliam Museum and be allowed to view an original manuscript of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. Words do not describe the beauty, and even modern facsimile editions can not capture the dazzling quality of the gold leafing that is speckled throughout. Blake is a wonder and a marvel. I have been fortunate enough to know his work.

Flaubert - Madame Bovary

2011-01-23T16:45:00.003+11:00

Gustave Flaubert's Madam Bovary is the sort of text we still need today. Not so much the text itself, but the way the text found the world. Written in the 1850's, the work sensationalised the Parisian public, and finally was put on trial for obscenity. The story tells of the wife of a public servant, who yearns for something more. She meets a cultured soul, who kindles in her a desire that had been safely hidden. The story is one we are very familiar with today, but have difficulty making great, in much the same way it was made great in the 19th century. We do not put books on trial anymore. We put authors on trial, in a sense, through their words. But books themselves are immune from makes them truly important.

Schizophrenia and Creativity (B)

2011-01-12T12:40:00.000+11:00

I have decided to research an academic piece, and finally produce a paper, on the intersection between schizophrenia and creativity. My own creative inclinations, my relative success, and my continuing battle with schizophrenia, have led me to want to try and come to some sort academic conclusions about this strange partnership. I think I want, fundamentally, to know why there have been times in the history of literature, where people have suffered from schizophrenia, and been able to succeed, to a marked degree, in their endeavours. It might simply be that, given a certain proportion of sufferers, some are likely to achieve despite the overwhelming negativity of their condition. But there seems something more to it than that. As I touched on earlier in an entry below, there is a loosening of association that can occur in schizophrenia, a loosening that lends itself naturally to conceptual and linguistic unusualness. And it is this unusualness which can lead to success in things creative. But my own creativity has something more to it than that. It is a certainty, that I can't explain, but which spills from my mind like some form of automatic machine. I guess I follow my intuition, and trust it, but it is something like a store of creative material that simply is released as I write. The writing is effortless, and seems to come out pre-formed as it were. But I will leave you here to tempt you, and leave you hanging for my research paper.

Paul Valery

2010-11-18T13:56:00.002+11:00

A favourite poet of mine, a poet who also had some philosophical aspirations, is Paul Valery. French, living in the 19th Century, he had a short (but successful) poetic career, until he turned to a more private pursuit of letters. During this absence from poetry, he kept a series of notebooks, known as the Cahiers. These books contained a systematic exploration of philosophical, literary, scientific and mathematical ideas, which was to secure Valery as on object of study for roughly 100 years. He finally returned to poetry in his later life, and always maintained the poignancy of his early work. His greatest work - La Juene Parque - is a testament to his complete command of the French language and its great poetic fluency.

Nietzsche and the Literary

2010-11-11T11:46:00.004+11:00

I take the German Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche to be one of the true early literary Philosophers. His ideas have sparked considerable controversy, and have indeed been associated with many unsavory moments in political history. But his thought is very much intended, I believe, to spark debate. He was familiar with the writings of Baudelaire, who also courted the controversial. Nietzsche's work in texts such as The Birth of Tragedy simply swim in the passionate execution of language in a very poetic and stylistic fashion. His distinction between the Dionysian and the Apollonian (a distinction, at heart between desire and restraint) has didactic resonances, but should rather be read as a poem might be read - for enjoyment and aesthetic appreciation. Nietzsche was also aware of Holderlin's work, and importantly struck up a correspondence with August Strindberg. These two writers have been covered below in this blog, and are important for understanding madness as it expresses itself in literature. Nietzsche's own madness, reputedly cause by a syphilitic condition, was to mark the end of an amazing and indeed controversial career as a thinker. And this is how we should take Nietzsche, as one to spark debate and controversy, not one to take didactically.

Dante Alighieri - Inferno

2010-11-04T13:24:00.003+11:00

Dante has always captivated me. His most profound text, I believe, is his Inferno. Part of a trilogy (Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso), the work is a literary exploration of hell as it is conceived in the Christian tradition. The poem, written in the terza rima form, is a powerful evocation of the torments that humans are prone to encounter. Its power, I believe, lies in the poem's depiction of suffering, and the many forms it can take. Dante, accompanied by his guide Virgil, enters hell to find a sprawling labyrinth of sin, decrepitude, and ultimately suffering. The poem is not simply, however a bleak exploration of the darker side of humanity. It has a dignity and sense of ultimate redemption which guides the reader through the torments they are reading of, and takes them on a journey to a certain appeasement of their own suffering. In this, Dante has constructed a sort of map you might call it - a map of (dis)ease, that has, at its heart, an ultimate salvation.

Interview on Radio National's 'All in the Mind'

2010-10-20T13:49:00.002+11:00

In September I was interviewed on Radio National for the show 'All in the Mind' hosted by Natasha Mitchell. The interview itself was a thoroughly enjoyable experience. We covered my book, Diary of a Schizophrenic, my PhD and my life with schizophrenia. It felt such a relief to finally have my battle with schizophrenia contribute in a substantial way to the public debate regarding the condition. One of the reasons I chose to pursue schizophrenia as a topic for my PhD was to help change public perceptions about the condition, and to help loosen the stigma that surrounds it.

I thought the show was very professionally put together. I had some music I selected (some Phillip Glass and Arvo Part) played to accompany some of the readings. I read from my diary, read a few poems, and delved into the philosophical intricacies of my PhD research.

It makes the long journey of the PhD seem utterly worth it, to have it enter the public domain, and hopefully make a difference.

You can download the interview, and see a few posted comments from listeners, on the ABC Radio National website:

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/allinthemind/stories/2010/3011065.htm

I believe the interview may also be available as free download on itunes.

I hope now to turn this public exposure into the potential to help effect real change in perceptions of psychosis.

Victorian Premiers Literary Awards Dinner

2010-10-10T11:41:00.002+11:00

Last week my wife and I attended the Victorian Premiers Literary Awards Dinner. My wife was convening judge for the Young Adult Fiction Prize. This is the second year we have attended, and a very enjoyable evening was had. The food was exquisite, the company very personable, and the presentations themselves were a real hoot. Each short list was performed as a musical comedy piece, which entertained the crowd no end. The speeches themselves by the winning authors were on the whole short, amusing, moving and at times inspiring. To see awards going to unpublished manuscripts, and seeing the look of utmost excitement on the winning authors face was quite a treat, and well worth being in attendance.

There were some real poignant, clever and biting speeches which gave a real insight into the minds of the winning authors. Awards such as these real change lives. One sentiment stuck in my mind. It went something like, 'its not the money or the fame which are important for awards such as these, but the opportunity to write one more book'.

Congratulations to all the winners, and looking forward to reading about those next books.

Writers Festival Wrap Up

2010-09-29T14:30:00.002+10:00

The launch of my book, Diary of a Schizophrenic, at the Melbourne Writers Festival, couldn't have gone any better. Everything came together on the day. We started with a speech prepared for the occasion by Dr Matthew Sharpe. The speech was brilliantly read by Stu Hatton. Dr Sharpe's speech was eloquent and indeed moving, and I am grateful to him for spending the time to write such considered words. I then gave my speech, which went as smoothly as could be expected. I spoke of my life since the writing of the diary and some of the successes I have enjoyed. I then read a few selections from the diary, and finished with a few poems.

We estimated there to be about 70 people in attendance, which was great. After the readings I signed some books and answered a few questions. Its was great chatting to people and hearing their interests and concerns about schizophrenia.

The venue (Feddish at Federation Square) was the perfect back drop to really have an enjoyable day. My family was there, as were many of my friends, and I am delighted I could contribute some small thing to the cultural milieu of Melbourne during that important week of the festival.

And yes, if you weren't there, you can easily buy a copy of the book on Amazon.

Launch at the Melbourne Writers Festival

2010-08-22T20:21:00.002+10:00

On Friday the 3rd of September I launch my book, Diary of a Schizophrenic, at the Melbourne Writers Festival. This has been a long held dream of mine, to participate in this festival, which I have attended over many years. The book itself is very close to my heart, and to see it gain a wider audience gives me a great sense of satisfaction. You can read blog entries below about the book, but in essence it is a dairy I kept in 1998 during a schizophrenic episode. A lot has happened in the meantime. I have passed a PhD, become married, become a father and had a rich working life. But most of all, I believe, I have lived, and in doing so given the book an added vitality which hopefully will serve it well.

At any rate, here are the details of the launch:

Date: Friday, the 3rd of September, 2010

Time: 11.30am - 12.30pm

Venue: Feddish, a bar at Federation Square, Melbourne , Australia

Attendance is free. You can buy the book, and I'll even sign it for you! Feel free to read below more about the book, how it came about, and its context in my life.

Hope to see you there.

Schizophrenia and Creativity

2010-07-04T19:36:00.002+10:00

There is a strong and well documented link between the vicissitudes of schizophrenia and creative and cultural production. While all instances of schizophrenic psychosis do not inevitably lead to creative outcomes, there have been some important and famous examples. My last post detailed the work of Karl Jaspers, and his examination of the two highly influential artists - Holderlin and Strindberg. Holderlin's fragmentation in poetry, and his disconnected images have influenced whole generations of poets, most notably (I believe) the modernists. Heidegger's interest in Holderlin has given his poetry a cultural significance that is of great importance for understanding the intersection of creativity and schizophrenia.

What is it about schizophrenia that lends itself to creativity? One important aspect of the condition is what is diagnostically known as 'loosening of association'. Words and concepts can combine in the speech and writing of schizophrenics in ways of association that are highly unusual. In refractory schizophrenics, these associations lead to word-salad type expressions that run counter to meaning. In some schizophrenics however, this unusual and loosened conceptual play can lead to quite successful creative outcomes. Writing, especially in mediums such as poetry, associations of words and concepts has to be loosened via an imaginary obfuscation which gives a pleasant unusualness. With the right vocabulary, this unusualness can lead to expression of beauty which are at the heart of poetry. Schizophrenics are in a perfect position to capitalise on this linguistic gymnastics, due to the above mentioned symptom - loosening of association.

There may be other aspects of schizophrenia that lend the condition to acts of creativity. I will leave these to further blog posts in the future.

Karl Jaspers

2010-06-20T18:57:00.002+10:00

In my PhD I looked at the philosopher and psychiatrist Karl Jaspers. Jaspers was important to my work, as he was medically trained in psychiatry, but held a deep interest in the cross-over between schizophrenia and creativity. His studies into the poet Friederich Holderlin and the playwright August Strindberg have been very important into my own studies into schizophrenia. Holderlin was very concerned with the world of Greek antiquity in his poetry, and through his schizophrenia, he came to believe that this world was a truly existing one. Martin Heidegger famously took an interest in the work of Holderlin, and this interest helped to ground his friendship (to an extent) with Jaspers. Strindberg, who also suffered from a deep schizophrenia, came to prominence through such plays as Miss Julie and The Father. He recorded his schizophrenic thinking in his work Inferno, and the document is important in understanding schizophrenic modes of being. Jaspers was well ahead of his time in examining these two seminal artistic figures. Even to diagnose them both as schizophrenic was ahead of its time - the diagnosis of schizophrenic cases was then, as it is now, a very controversial area of inquiry.

Jaspers gives a solid medical grounding to his work, and this gives his corpus a clarity which is invaluable into understanding creative manifestations of schizophrenia. Jaspers should be a first point of reference to anyone interested in how cultural production can be underpinned by schizophrenic processes.

Marcel Proust - In Search of Lost Time

2010-06-13T19:18:00.002+10:00

There was quite an extended time, when asked who was my favourite author, I would say 'Marcel Proust'. His major work, In Search of Lost Time (also translated as Remembrance of Things Past) is a monumental work. One of the longest novels in world literature, it is an epic in a different sense to War and Peace. We might call it an aesthetic epic. This is one of the key narrative devices that Proust employs - an exploration of the arts and culture. Swann, one of the main protagonists, at one point hears a phrase from a sonata being played by a pianist at a soirée, and becomes obsessed. This concern with art is paramount for Proust. Proust had a passion for the English aesthete John Ruskin, who himself was a considerable dilettante who dedicate his life to the exploration of art. In Proust's In Search of Lost Time, people are continually being compared to classic works of art, as artists play their way around the stage of this sprawling drama. But it is a drama that is in a sense gentle and soothing (to an extent). I feel the book has a soporific quality. This normally would be said to detract from a book, but the kind of sleep it induces is one of those blissfully calm sleeps that one has a Sunday morning while it is raining outside. This brings me to the second quality of the book - and that is the poetic quality. Their are touching and moving descriptions of light playing amongst trees, wind rustling leaves, moonlight on still nights, and all the sorts of things that the poets of the ages have sung about. This combination of aesthetics and poetry makes In Search of Lost Time a powerful document. But a third ingredient elevates this text to greatness. And that is the psychological insight Proust employs to gather around his characters and their various forays into human drama. Character's words, actions and behaviours are imbued with a sharp clarity of description that gives each a wonderful human quality - a quality that all epic texts display.

Overall In Search of Lost Time stands above almost all of the great works written in the last hundred years. It is an achievement that will defy what time can bring down.

Octavio Paz

2010-06-06T19:14:00.002+10:00

I count Octavio Paz as one of the most influential writers to my own writing that I have so far encountered. His poetry is technically proficient, inspirational and unusual enough to let him stand as one of the great poets of world literature. But his oeuvre includes so much more. Literary studies, political writing, explorations of aesthetics and art are all inclusive in this great man's contribution to world letters.

His great poem I believe is 'Sunstone'. A sprawling aesthetic vision, it takes the reader to where they most want to go - that is through the clouds and into what is beyond. My favourite prose work of Paz's is Alternating Currents. It combines thought, words and concepts in usual and delightful ways, and explores literature and art in such a bold and assured way that one is only swept along with delight.

It all started for Paz in his grandfather's library where he was able to read extensively as a young boy. The depth of his learning and poetic voice no doubt stem from this time.

Paz showed courage to resign from his post as a Mexican diplomat in protest of the deaths of Mexican students by government hands.

Paz's award of the Nobel Prize is only a small testament to his outstanding achievement. It is the assuredness of his writing, particularly of his poetry, which really strikes one. In fact even his prose has a poetic brilliance which distinguishes this man as a poet foremost (he thought so himself) and otherwise a writer of great intelligence.

Arvo Part

2010-05-30T18:46:00.002+10:00

The Estonian composer Arvo Part has always been for me an exemplar of what can be achieved post the fragmentation and atonality of modernism. Part, in his early compositions, worked closely with the techniques of Schoenberg and the dissonance which his program encompasses. But what occurred next was to move music in a new and logical (yet undiscovered) direction. Part repatriated the tonal and harmonious, and did so still (somehow) with elements of atonality lingering in the shadows. This seems like a simple synergy of what came before with what was contemporaneous. But a successful combination of these elements had not been achieved with such popular appeal.

Pieces such as Spiegal im Spiegal give a light and harmonious dance that please the ear with their rounded and polished sounds. Alternatively, pieces such as Lamentate and Miserere almost assault the ear with a harsh brilliance that disturbs as it delights. Perhaps Part's greatest work, Cantus in Memoriam of Benjamin Britten bridges the gap, and moves with a tension and indeed ugliness that brushes the sublime and yet is grounded in the commonplace.

Part should be savoured for his achievement. He has once again allowed us to believe in beauty, but in a Baudelairian sense that touches what is uncomfortable, but still very much worth attaining.

Huysmans - A Rebours

2010-05-23T19:21:00.002+10:00

Joris-Karl Huysmans' novel A Rebours (Against Nature) is a classic of decadent literature. Its dark pessimism (partly inspired by Schopenhauer) is striking in its literary expression. Huysmans is concerned with what is deeply ambiguous about the human condition, and the work shocks as it delights.

It was A Rebours that shot Odilon Redon to fame. It was the first time Redon's work had received such wide exposure. The reason Huysmans included Redon in his work was that it exemplified perfectly the strangeness and disconnection that Huysmans was attempting to imbue in A Rebours.

Another important figure of nineteenth century French artistic culture, Charles Baudelaire, finds his way into the pages of this beguiling text. Huysmans first work, a collection of prose poems, was said to be very much influenced by Baudelaire. As with Redon, Baudelaire gives voice to the darker side of humanity, and does so in a wonderfully extravagant literary way. Baudelaire shocked, just as Huysmans was to, and therein lies the latters interest.

Other notable figures of French letters at the time find there way into A Rebours. Stephane Mallarme is discussed at length, as is Paul Verlaine. Mallarme is much preferred by Huysmans - Verlaine is accused of being derivative. A further interesting figure to appear is Edgar Allan Poe. Poe is very interesting in terms of this epoch of French writing. Most of those writing in Paris at the time were strongly influenced by Poe, and indeed Mallarme and Baudelaire were heavily indebted.

A Rebours is a momentous and meticulous work. In many respects it is encyclopedic in its knowledge of fields as diverse as Latin poetry and botany. Its attention to the smallest detail gives this work a breath that will astonish all those who read this wonderful text for the first time.

A Passed PhD

2010-05-16T19:15:00.002+10:00

I have recently had word that my PhD has passed. The news presented a feeling of relief and satisfaction. Relief that a long journey is now at an end, and satisfaction at the obstacles I have overcome to achieve my goal.

My PhD is in the discipline of Philosophy, and examined the topic of schizophrenia. This was an important choice for me to write on schizophrenia, as I suffer from schizophrenia myself. I feel my philosophical work on schizophrenia has been given greater insight by my personal experiences into the condition.

The thesis looked at theorists such as Sigmund Freud, Karl Jaspers, Gilles Deleuze and Luce Irigaray. It also used the thought of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Martin Heidegger to interpret what in fact schizophrenia is.

I hope this achievement can give hope to others suffering from schizophrenia, that success in life is possible despite the impediments that schizophrenia presents.

Diary of a Schizophrenic

2010-04-26T11:04:00.003+10:00

My book, Diary of a Schizophrenic, has recently been released as a paperback. The book was written during a schizophrenic episode I had in 1998. The first half of the book was written while I was ill, but the second half was written during the recovery which followed. I am proud of this book, for a number of reasons. Firstly it gives a positive outcome for a very negative experience. Anyone who has experienced a schizophrenic episode knows how debilitating it can be. Secondly, the initial release of the e-book, and now the paperback, occurred during my candidature for a PhD. My PhD is on schizophrenia (in philosophy), and so I thought it important to give hope to those suffering schizophrenia that success is possible after an episode. And I might add, it took some courage to go public during a degree which is so important to me.

The book is interesting because it does show the hallmarks of psychosis (delusion, avolition, anhedonia), but it is on the whole very clearly written. It delves quite extensively into literature and art, and mentions a whole host of the classics such as Homer's Odyssey, Virgil's Aeneid, John Milton's Paradise Lost and Goethe's Faust. It mentions many classic authors such as Walt Whitman and William Blake. I was about to commence my honours year at university, and my thesis was to be on Ludwig Wittgenstein, so I write quite extensively about him. Many artists are mentioned, and trips to galleries and plays detailed. Overall I would call it an aesthetic book.

Things have gone pretty well for me subsequent to this episode. I am now married with a son. My poetry has been published in a number of good journals, which you can find in other blog entries below. I have had academic articles published (again see below), and I am working and am generally enjoying life.

Now time for a bit of promotion. You can buy a copy of my book from a number of places. Amazon in the UK are selling it, as are Amazon in the US. Books on Board are selling the e-book, as are Amazon in the US (as a Kindle book). Chipmunkapublishing are the publishers of the book, and you can get copies of the paperback or e-book by going to their website. Just click on any of the above links you'll get to the respective shops. The book may also be ordered in from any bookshop.

If you choose to buy the book, I hope you enjoy it. As I said it has given a very negative experience a very positive outcome. I hope the book can work to help diminish some of the stigma surrounding mental illness in society.

Pablo Neruda

2010-03-16T10:59:00.002+11:00

I have only recently come across the work of Pablo Neruda, which saddens me. A work so vibrant and unusually original should come early in one's life, so as to be savoured through the years.

And what I find in Neruda's work is a sadness - a sadness that has an intensity that bends the language. It is not a despairing sadness, but a sweet sadness that all great poetry possesses.

I also find his poetry strangely apolitical (from what I have read, which is a small selection to be sure). This was a strange discovery, as his life was very political indeed, making his being awarded the Nobel a controversial choice.

But most of all I like where Neruda takes you. It is an elsewhere that is perhaps outside time and place, and is somewhere all poets would like to be.

Launch of Sketch

2010-03-06T15:25:00.002+11:00

On Thursday I attended the launch of issue two of Sketch, a journal in which I have two poems. Sketch is a publication featuring poetry, digital design, photography, fiction, and is a very attractive publication. The launch was held at Chaise Lounge, a bar in Melbourne's CBD. The night was welcomed in by a cool band, with an excellent vocalist. The bar had a cocktail specifically designed for the launch, which I thought was a touch of class.

It was my honour to read first. It was quite a large gathering, so I held back my nerves. My readings went well, and the others that were to follow gave me gave me a great sense of the quality of the contributors. Issue two of Sketch had submissions from as far afield as Europe and America, which I thought was impressive for a second edition.

The link here will take you to Sketch's website, where if you are interested, copies may be ordered.

A good night was had by all. The band rounded out the night. I took great advantage of the special price for the house red, and stumbled home to my goodly wife.

Lorca

2010-01-31T18:42:00.002+11:00

Federico Garcia Lorca stands at the top of Spanish literature. And for very good reason. He mastered two distinct and at times diametrically opposed styles of poetry. The first is the dreamy, almost sea inspired (it seems) style that he perfected in poems such as 'Nocturnal Air' written in 1919. In these poems his constant reference to the moon, hearts, shadows, fountains and the like, gives each poetic expression a sense of the oneiric. It is my belief that all great poets imbue this sensibility into their work at some time.

The other style is more intellectual, jarring, and uncomfortable. The poems which spring from this muse can be found in his Poet in New York. It is my guess that such poems were inspired and influenced by his relationship to Dali and the Surrealism that shaped Dali's own oeuvre. Associations in these poems are odd and out of place. The moon and shadows still find their way into these creations, but more common are the 'tapeworms', 'wounded cow's horns', and 'horse's eyes' that jolt you rather than send you into a comfortable calm. Lorca is perhaps more technically accomplished in these later poems, but it will be the 'dream-style' poetry (as we'll call it) that will cement his place in the cannon of world literature.

New Beginnings

2010-01-25T11:38:00.005+11:00

Apologies for the length of time it has taken me to post a new blog. I have been finishing my PhD, which is now handed in. I now have time to devote to other writings, such as this one.

I am also pleased to announce that my book, 'Diary of a Schizophrenic' (published through Chipmunkapublishing) is now available as a Kindle book on Amazon in the US. This gives me great satisfaction, as it was written during a very difficult time. I am pleased that this difficulty has eventually led to such a positive outcome. Thank you to Chipmunka for their support of the project.

I have also had some poems published in the time since my last blog. The journals Page Seventeen, Pendulum, Unusual Work and Mascara Literary Review have picked up and published poems of mine. The Mascara poems are published online, which you can view here. I also have a poem coming out in the new edition of Sketch (out shortly).

Anyway, you'll here from me again soon.

Yves Bonnefoy

2009-10-10T14:28:00.002+11:00

For a while now I have admired the poetry of the French poet Yves Bonnefoy. What drew me to his work initially was simply his name. Browsing through a local bookstore, the name stood out. I sort of knew I would like the poetry I found - and I did.

Bonnefoy's best known book is his On the Motion and Immobility of Douve. It is a work that simply seeps with originally rendered sentiment and novel turns of phrase. It is the language itself of the work, rather than simply the images, that draw one on a journey of poetic and aesthetic pleasure. Bonnefoy manages to say something new in a way that echoes what has gone before - but only enough to let the familiarity we feel peek into the possibilities of what poetry can convey.

Bonnefoy has also written critical work, on such poets as Rimbaud and Baudelaire. Those familiar to this blog will recognise poets here that also captivate my attention. It doesn't surprise me that Bonnefoy has a special concern for these two, as his poetry reflects them (while going beyond them).

In his youth Bonnefoy study Philosophy, which interests me, as I am also a poet who studies Philosophy. Bonnefoy was to burn a thesis he wrote in Philosophy, perhaps not wanting history to be privy to his early theoretical work. But in his youthful interest in Philosophy, Bonnefoy shares in a great tradition, including T. S. Eliot and William Blake, of poets who at some time turned to Philosophy.

I look forward with great interest to what Bonnefoy creates in his future. It is a future that will in some way shape the progression of world literature to come.

Deleuze and Schizophrenia

2009-09-13T15:36:00.002+10:00

Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari's work Anti-Oedipus explores the notion of schizophrenia, and does so via a combination of two seemingly disparate domains of inquiry. Firstly it is a literary work. In being so it aims to shock, display stylistic originalities, bend the rules of language and in the end startle us with its bold audacity. But on the other hand it is work that analyses schizophrenia, and as such is situated (probably reluctantly) in the fields of psychopathology, psychology and even psychiatry to a limited extent. But these two currents that run through Anti-Oedipus are often considerably divergent.

But the book interests me because I am engaging in academic work on schizophrenia in the discipline of Philosophy. In this work I have situated my research squarely in the medical model of understanding the condition. I see schizophrenia as a disease that needs to be palliated, and feel that things like medication are invaluable in treating the condition. But I am also a poet, having had poems published in journals such as Stylus and verb-ate-him. And so I am very interested in literary understanding of schizophrenia, which can in some instances be at odds with the medical model, and this is where Anti-Oedipus fits in for me.

Anti-Oedipus postulates a socio-economic understanding of schizophrenia, situating the disease in the broader fabric of a capitalist system that puts such strain on individuals that they break under the pressure. Coming from the medical model as I do, where biological irregularities are seen to underlay schizophrenia, this seems difficult to reconcile with a socio-economic understanding. But as the diathesis-stress model of schizophrenia postulates, environmental factors (perhaps even economic ones) that cause stress are part of the aetiological chain in schizophrenic processes. Deleuze and Guattari may have a point to make here.

But what really fascinates me about Anti-Oedipus is the way the insights that are contained in the book are expressed. There is a stylistic (and indeed literary) flair which is quite seductive. What Deleuze and Guattari say about schizophrenia is in many ways intended to shock, and works by shocking those in the establishment that adhere to the more traditional understandings such as the medical model. In this they succeed, and have made their book a literary success.

Schizophrenia and Philosophy

2009-08-30T13:31:00.002+10:00

I have recently had an article published in an academic journal in the UK. The journal is called 'Consciousness Literature and the Arts', and the article explores the life and work of the ballet dancer Nijinsky who suffered from schizophrenia, and is entitled 'Nijinsky: Ballet, Schizophrenic Consciousness and Philosophy'. In particular it examines a diary he kept while he was entering into his first episode. This is interesting for me as I have had my own diary published through Chipmunkapublishing, also in the UK. My diary, 'Diary of a Schizophrenic' was kept in 1998 when I also experienced an episode. What is similar about both these diaries is that they both have detailed philosophical content. I was about to enter my honours year at university and was to write my thesis on Wittgenstein, and I mention him numerous times in the diary. Nijinsky was Reading Nietzsche and Schopenhauer and writes about them in his diary. What makes this all the more interesting for me is that I am now doing a PhD in Philosophy on schizophrenia. I have used my experiences to gain insight into the condition which I am utilising in my work on schizophrenia at a university level. I have also given a number of papers at academic conferences on my research. I have given a paper on Wittgenstein and schizophrenia, Heidegger and schizophrenia, and Immanuel Kant and schizophrenia, amongst others. I have used their ideas to interpret what schizophrenia may be.

I am hoping with my background and my academic training I can work to progress the debate about schizophrenia and help to diminish some of the stigma that surrounds the condition.

Apollinaire

2009-08-15T14:52:00.002+10:00

Guillaume Apollinaire was a poet who led, one might say, a very adventurous life. Born Gulielmo de Kostrowitzky, he later changed his name in order to further his literary career. Indeed the name Apollinaire, with its resonances with the Greek god Apollo, strongly draws one to his oeuvre.

Apollinaire spent a period of time growing up near a gambling resort, and this may have influenced his later forays into the world of Parisian literature. He was to develop an important friendship with Picasso, and it was during this time that Apollinaire was to encounter his most famous scandal.

Apollinaire had steadily been gaining a reputation as a fine and original poet, and wrote on art and artists for a number of journals. His interest in art was almost his undoing. He had employed a secretary to help with his literary projects. This man turned out to be an art thief. He gave two statues to Picasso, who bought them unknowing of their origin. They had in fact been stolen from the Louvre.

Co-incidentally, and tragically, a few years after this incident, a separate theft took place at the Louvre. On this different occasion someone had stolen the Mona Lisa. As one could imagine, it was quite a scandal.

It came to the attention of the authorities that Apollinaire had recently been associated with objects de art stolen from the Louvre. Apollinaire was subsequently arrested and interrogated in relation to the Mona Lisa theft. It become clear that Apollinaire was no thief, and after informing the police of the identity of his secretary, he was released.

The scandal was however very large. Apollinaire was one of only a few people in France to be arrested for the crime, and his name was dragged through the press around the country, and indeed around the world. It was to have quite an impact on Apollinaire, and in many ways established his broader fame as a poet.

But it was to leave a deep scar on his life, and even after he was acquitted, people still were quite accusative and derisive of him. Sometimes the price of fame can indeed be high.

Odilon Redon

2009-08-05T20:43:00.002+10:00

The French artist Odilon Redon has always fascinated me. His oeuvre can be divided into two distinct periods - the earlier Noirs, and the latter pastels that gave colour to his haunting images. The Noirs, images in distinctive black and white, plumbed the depths of Redon's imagination. Many of them were indeed unusual, and expressed some deep and irrational part of Redon's mind. The latter pastels, including the famous series depicting Pegasus, displayed a distinctive dream-like quality. Redon often spoke of the indeterminacy that characterised these images and his art more generally, and these latter pastels do indeed displayed such dreamy vagueness.

Redon's art is loosely categorised under the banner of 'Symbolism'. It is a movement that is inclusive of Rimbaud, Verlaine, Baudelaire and Mallarme. In fact Redon was to foster a significant friendship with Mallarme. Another friendship that was also to be important for Redon was that with Joris-Karl Huysmans. It was Huysmans that included a passage on Redon in his decadent novel 'A Rebours'. A Rebours was to become a cult classic in Parisian culture of the time, and its success catapulted Redon into fame.

The word to describe Redon's oeuvre is 'oneiric'; meaning dream-like. Redon followed his imagination, and it lead him to create images that one may find in the somnambulistic realms we tread through in our nocturnal mental wanderings (dreams).

Charles Baudelaire

2009-07-18T18:18:00.002+10:00

Baudelaire came to fame primarily through his work Fleurs du Mal. What drew the work to the attention of the literary (and broader) world was a trial for obscenity that Baudelaire was subjected to for publication of the work. Six poems were removed from future editions of the book, and he was fined. While Baudelaire wrote in the 19th century, the ban on these six poems lasted well into the 20th century.

Baudelaire was, it can be said, an acolyte of beauty. His poems do court controversy, and explore the darker side of humanity, but they are truly grounded in what is beautiful. This dichotomy in Baudelaire's work gave it its originality.

Baudelaire was to be hounded by creditors throughout his life. When he had money (and even when he didn't) he was lavish with his spending. He acquired objects de art, fine furniture, and fine clothing, but lived as poet with limited means. His entire life, it could be said, was beset with difficulty and indeed trauma (much of which was self-inflicted).

But Baudelaire's legacy is indeed a rich one. The trauma which was his life gave birth to an oeuvre which is truly outstanding as it is originality.

Arthur Rimbaud

2009-07-01T19:29:00.002+10:00

Arthur Rimbaud provided perhaps as interesting a life as did poetic output. For having had such a short creative life, it is quite astounding the legacy he left. He for all intensive purposes gave up poetry in his early twenties. He then travelled widely before establishing himself as a merchant trader in Africa.

Rimbaud's fame as a poet was in many respects facilitated by his relationship to the fellow poet Paul Verlaine. Verlaine welcomed Rimbaud when he arrived in Paris and took him under his wing. Rimbaud was heralded as the 'new genius', and Verlaine was keen to expedite his rise. What was to follow would shock the literary world at the time.

Verlaine and Rimbaud began a romantic relationship. Verlaine was married. Homosexuality at the time was outlawed and frowned upon, and so their relationship courted not only controversy, but the law. They travelled to England together, and wrote and taught poetry under each others influence. It was when they returned from England that one of the more famous episodes in French literature took place.

One afternoon, Verlaine had purchased a pistol before meeting Rimbaud, and had been drinking heavily. They had always had a stormy relationship, and Verlaine's temper was well known. In their hotel room, Verlaine pointed the pistol at Rimbaud and fired two shots. The second missed, but the first struck Rimbaud in the wrist. Rimbaud went to hospital and was treated. He then re-united with Verlaine, but the later was still drunk. Verlaine threatened Rimbaud again, and this time Rimbaud found a near by police officer and reported the incident.

Verlaine was charged. Rimbaud, perhaps feeling for his friend, withdrew the charge. Put for Verlaine it was too late. He was imprisoned for 2 years.

Rimbaud, perhaps as a result of this incident was to give up poetry entirely. He moved to Africa, and as was mentioned, became a trader. He was even at one point to become an arms dealer to a local King.

The high point of Rimbaud's poetry would have to be Une Saison en Enfer (A Season in Hell). In it, Rimbaud cast aside traditional poetic devices and structures, and wrote poetry that was to cement his place in literary history.

Stephane Mallarme

2009-06-24T15:41:00.002+10:00

Stephane Mallarme can be considered amongst my most favourite poets. French, living at the end of the 19th century, Mallarme was at the vanguard of an epoch that I believe has not yet been surpassed. Contemporaries such as Paul Verlaine, Paul Valery, Arthur Rimbaud, Marcel Proust and Charles Baudelaire form for me a rich period of literary creation.

Mallarme for me comes as close to a Shakespearean voice as can be found outside of England. You get a sense that Mallarme's command of the language is in total keeping with the greats of any culture. He was to court controversy in his career, having his career as a school teacher hampered by reactions to his poetic output.

Mallarme held informal literary gatherings at his apartment in Paris called Mardis (meaning Tuesdays, when they were held). There the cream of the literary elite would meet, and mostly listen to Mallarme, but also profess their own views on literature. It is these sorts of meetings that are the lifeblood of a literary culture.

Mallarme can be considered an innovator and experimenter, but also a voice that held true to many of the traditions of the past. In this he found his greatness. His poetry is at times difficult to read, but persistence in the face of these difficulties bares much fruit, as so many have found.

Arnold Schoenberg

2009-06-14T17:51:00.003+10:00

The Austrian composer Arnold Schoenberg interests me deeply. He was probably the last major composer to shock the public to any great degree. His twelve-tone composing technique would cause audiences to riot in some cases. He wrote a-tonal music when more traditional forms of harmony and contrapuntal music were dominant.

Schoenberg intrigues me because I wonder to myself - where do we go next? We have moved from tonality to a-tonality, and this dichotomy seems to exhaust the possibilities. It interests me as a poet, because using this dichotomy as a metaphor and applying it to poetry, we might say we have moved from the tonal classical structures of meter and rhyme, to the a-tonal structures of experimentation, free verse and effacement of meaning.

Schoenberg in many ways showed us a new way to turn. He employed a sharp auto-didactic knowledge toward constructing theories of composition, which created work that was new and shocking. But it has been a hundred years since some of his major works, and we are still in many respects caught in the tonal/atonal bind. What is outside this duality in terms of creativity? Do we simply move to the past and draw once again from the classical - a movement which has been necessitated at numerous intervals in the history of creativity? Or can we actually create something truly new - and will it be enough to shock the establishment, or will it only be an echo of what the past has given us?

Vaslav Nijinsky

2009-06-07T17:05:00.005+10:00

Vaslav Nijinsky was a ballet dancer who danced at the beginning of the 20th century. He rose to fame as the lead in Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes. The Ballets Russes was to become one the most successful and important dance companies of that epoch. Its fame was brought about largely by the dancing of Nijinsky. He had by all accounts and extra-ordinary leap that could spring him to great heights, even allowing him to 'pause' for a time in the air. The Ballets Russes was to commission scores from Debussy and Stravinsky, and Nijinsky used their work to choreograph his own works, such as 'The Right of Spring' and 'Afternoon of a Faune' (based on the poem by Stephane Mallarme). Some of these works by Nijinsky were to create a number of scandals, and could be considered in many respects the pre-cursor to many modernist trends in dance that were to follow.

What interest me in Nijinsky is that, at the end of his career, Nijinsky was to succumb to schizophrenia. He was diagnosed schizophrenic by Eugene Blueler, the professor who coined the term schizophrenia itself. As he began to descend into schizophrenia he kept a diary. This interests me, as I have had my own diary, 'Diary of a Schizophrenic', published by Chipmunka Publishing (www.chipmunkapublishing.com). Nijinsky's diary is has all the hallmarks of the schizophrenic mind. There are delusions of self-reference (where the sufferer believes ordinary events refer specifically for their benefit). There are characteristic linguistic difficulties such as 'clanging' and 'bizarre associations'. He relates perceptual experiences that may indeed be hallucinations.

After compiling his diary, Nijinsky was to spend the remaining 30 years of his life in and out of institutions. He was unable to care for his own needs, and his wife Romola took care of him.

Nijinsky is considered by many to have been the greatest dancer of the 20th century. His life provides much interesting material for those wishing to understand the cross-over between creativity and schizophrenia.

August Strindberg

2009-05-10T16:22:00.002+10:00

The Swedish dramatist August Strindberg is important in understanding creative intersections with schizophrenia. He rose to fame with plays such as The Father and Miss Julie. The piece that is however of most interest to those wishing to understand how schizophrenia arises in works of literature is his text Inferno. Strindberg based this text on a diary he kept during a time which he was to undergo a schizophrenic episode. This is obviously of interest to me, as I have had my diary published in which I was suffering through a similar episode. My work, Diary of a Schizophrenic, is similar and yet different to Strindberg's. Strindberg compiled the material for the text of Inferno from a different source, and added to it, adapted it, and generally polished and crafted it to completion. Diary of a Schizophrenic was written during the time of experiencing an episode. It details delusions such as the belief that 'portions' of my 'being' could detach from themselves from my body at certain moments of momentum shift. I felt that light and sound could enter my mind and damage it. Strindberg also writes of strange delusions. He believes that people bent on his harm are sending electrical currents through his room. He feels that lightning that strikes near by is specifically directed at him (a delusion known as a 'delusion of self-reference'). Both works are, I believe clearly written. Both have a self-reflexive interest in literature. Diary of a Schizophrenic concerns itself with Milton's Paradise Lost, Homer's Odyssey, Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. Inferno details Strindberg's life as a writer, and focuses on Swedenborg amongst other writers and thinkers.

It is a contentious point as to whether Strindberg actually was suffering a psychosis during the period that is depicted in Inferno. Authors such as Mary Sandbach and Olof Langercrantz argue that Strindberg was not, during these times of great suffering, experiencing a schizophrenic break. Sandbach even argues that Strindberg was aware of the literary value of appearing mad, and so constructed his psychosis to further his career.

But against these arguments I say that the details of Strindberg's madness as presented in Inferno and his diary are so detailed, and so accurate, that they could only have come from a genuine episode. Strindberg details in Inferno how he opens the Bible at random places to receive guidance and reassurance in a sort of mystical divining. This is exactly what I was to do at various times during my schizophrenic episode in 1998 when I was keeping my diary. Strindberg, in his diary feels he is having a sort of ethereal communion with his wife who he was separated from. He felt she would 'visit' him when she was in fact great distances away. The level of detail, and the ability to act these delusions out in real life, would require a level of commitment that I think would be beyond anyone to sustain for any length of time. I think Strindberg would have had to have been a psychiatrist himself to have actually known how to achieve such a feat of faux-psychosis.

Antonin Artaud

2009-05-03T18:41:00.004+10:00

One of my favourite writers is Antonin Artaud. French, living in the early part of the 20th century, he came to create a body of work that was original as it was shocking. Like Holderlin, he suffered from schizophrenia. Unlike Holderlin, who lived in a different epoch, he was to be institutionalised on a number of occasions, famously to be treated by Jacques Lacan at one point. Artaud appeared in a number of movies with small (but never the less distinguished) roles. He early on turned his hand to poetry, famously entering into correspondence with Jacques Riviere who edited the journal 'Nouvelle Revue Francaise '. He wrote books as well, notably 'The Theatre and its Double' and 'Heliogabalus'. The oeuvre which he left is quite extensive in range and scope.

Artaud is interesting because his schizophrenia really comes to the foreground in his work. His poetry contains many scatological elements, and his general language using propensities display characteristic schizophrenic traits. He shocks with his imagery, his invention of concepts such as the Theatre of Cruelty, and his persistent drive to create something new and revolutionary. His radio plays were banned before being aired, he was expelled from the Surrealist movement of which he was a member. But there was one thing about his life that would transcend the disappointments of his numerous setbacks - and that was his ability to overcome the condition of schizophrenia to produce works of considerable cultural importance.

Holderlin

2009-04-23T19:36:00.002+10:00

The poetry of the 18th century German poet Friedrich Holderlin can in many respects be considered a precursor to many modern forms of poetic expression. He was born in 1770, but gave the world an oeuvre that resonates strongly with modern poetry - through modernism and postmodernism to the contemporary. Some of his poetry (although by no means all) displays the fragmentation characteristic of today's work. His subject matter plays with meaning. He combines classical motifs with contemporaneous concerns, much like Pound, Eliot and other modernists. Essentially, he is a modern poet.

And there is, I will argue here, a particular reason why this might be considered the case. Essentially Holderlin was mad. He is now commonly thought of as having suffered from schizophrenia. The philosopher Karl Jaspers in various works argues this point. In 1801 Holderlin lost his hold on reality, and the world of Greek antiquity that he was imbuing throughout his poetry, became a real and existing one in his mind. And this brings me to the argument of this post. Modern poetry, with its polymorphous meanings, its stilted meters, its free verse, its neglect of formal structures such as rhyme, alliteration and assonance, its line breaks and grammatical irregularities, is essentially trying to emulate the sorts of poetic expressions that are common in forms of madness such as schizophrenia.

I obviously have a vested interest in this argument. I am a poet and suffer from schizophrenia. Maybe I am only hoping and wishing that those with schizophrenia are important in setting the trends of poetic expression. But I believe there is more to my argument than this. I believe that in forms of madness such as schizophrenia there is the seed of a poetic expression that is currently considered hegemonic. Perhaps those who now create in this vein aren't themselves schizophrenic, but they are creating in a manner which was inspired by those such as Holderlin who, having broken with reality, created with surprising originality.

Poetry

2009-04-19T20:32:00.002+10:00

I recently gave a reading of some of my poems at the launch of the journal Unusual Work. I was speaking to someone afterward, and they commented that my poetry reminded them of French poetry. There could have been no greater compliment for me. French poetry is by far my favourite, particularly French poetry from the 19th century. My favourite of this era is Stephane Mallarme, but others such as Charles Baudelaire, Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine and Paul Valery are close to my heart. I haven't consciously gone out to emulate these poets, but their words have permeated my reading to such an extent that it is natural their voices come through in my own work. And their biographies have also always been close to my reading table. The relationship between Rimbaud and Verlaine has always fascinated me, as has the life of Mallarme, which was much more mundane than those other two poets. I think Mallarme's 'A Throw of the Dice' is in many respects one of the first modern poems (apart maybe from those of Holderlin). A Throw of the dice has the loose and fragmented structure of much modern poetry. But what makes it really interesting is its style and substance is that it is very rooted in the 19th century. Modern poetry with its fragmented structures has associated with that fragmented meanings, styles and syntax. In 'A Throw of The Dice' you get a sense that you are reading classical poetry, but what you are witnessing on the page is never the less very modern. I think this is the appeal of Mallarme for the modern reader. We can get our fixed of stilted fragmentation, but we can still get the language of the classical poets with its resonances of formal structure.

Philosophy

2009-04-09T19:34:00.005+10:00

I have been writing academic philosophy for quite a number of years now. When I arrived to start my PhD, my supervisor was very keen for me to give papers at conferences. I was initially reluctant, but he was persistent. I then, over a number of years, was to give a number of papers at philosophy conferences. I mention this, because some of these papers, or at least their abstracts, have become quite popular online. I googled a few of my papers recently, and found them quite high up on the search rankings. One of my papers, 'A Wittgensteinian Analysis of Schizophrenia' is, at my last look, the top search result for the search "Wittgensteinian" and "schizophrenia". The abstract for a paper I am giving in the middle of this year, 'Heidegger, Being-in-the-world and Schizophrenia' was on the third page of results for the search "Heidegger" and "schizophrenia", although it has now fallen down the rankings a bit. This was a nice discovery for me. It means that people are interested in my thoughts on schizophrenia, which for someone suffering from the condition, is encouraging. If someone who suffers from schizophrenia can write of the disease and have their thoughts read, then hopefully we can come to a better understanding of what the syndrome is. Schizophrenia is very much an opaque condition, that has so far resisted research and analysis. We haven't come to many definite conclusions about exactly what it is, despite all our efforts. So hopefully, if someone suffering from schizophrenia can have their voice heard, and heard regrading what they think the condition is, then maybe we can move further forward to our understanding of this baffling condition. Anyway, here's hoping.

Beginnings

2009-03-28T17:24:00.009+11:00

My reason for starting this blog is fundamentally a love of all things literary. I want to write about this love, discuss it and bring it to the open air. Another reason for starting a blog is that I have recently had a book published. It is a very exciting time for me. I have been writing for years, and have been simply binding my books in leather and leaving them on my bookshelf in my study. It's been great to show off when friends come over, but I have to say I had been a bit remiss to not send things away. I have also been engaged in academic writing, doing a Masters, and now doing a PhD, but not really getting things published. Except for one exception - a philosophy article published in a journal called Cogito.

My wife would see a change to that reticence. She very much encouraged me to start submitting things. I started sending poems initially. I got my first published poem in a journal called Unusual Work quite early on in this sending away process. A year later I had some more poems accepted by them. My poetry to this point seems to be going well. I have two poems out in Stylus, and another poem in verb-ate-him.

I thought I would also send out some of the books I had written. Initially there wasn't much luck, but then a publisher by the name of Chipmunka Publishing picked up a diary I had kept in 1998. What made this diary interesting is that at the time I was experiencing a schizophrenic episode.

I have subsequently recovered from this time in my life, but left a very interesting literary document. I hope this book shows what can be achieved after a period of mental illness has passed.

A little plug for my book at this point. The title is 'Diary of a Schizophrenic' - you can get a copy by going to following link, which is Chipmunka's bookshop:

http://chipmunkapublishing.co.uk/shop/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=1322

The book is currently an e-book, but will become a paperback in the future. The book costs five pounds. In it you will find the strange irrationalities of the schizophrenic mind. But surprisingly the book is quite clearly written - despite the experience I was having. The work is full of references to writers, poets, philosophers and artists. There are lengthy discussions of Ludwig Wittgenstein, William Blake, the Pre-Raphealites, Homer, Virgil, T.S. Eliot, and a whole range of other creative artists. I think this is what makes this diary unique. Others have famously kept journals through psychotic episodes - Daniel Schreber and Vaslav Nijinsky come to mind. Schreber's work was famously analysed by Freud, and is far more psychotic, I believe, than my work. Nijinsky, the famous dancer, also suffered from schizophrenia. During the initial stages of his psychosis he kept a diary, a document which was also very psychotic. Nijinsky also alluded to literature and philosophy in his diary, but I believe not to the extent Diary of a Schizophrenic does.

But of course, my literary pre-occupations go further than those found in psychosis. My academic work and my poetry have been important in keeping my feet on the ground, and I can report I have been quite symptom free for a number of years.

Anyway I hope you enjoy this blog and its adventures into the literary. Speak to you again soon.