Madness in Literature and Visual Culture

anna six is a Reader at the University of Warwick, UK who specialises in madness, trauma, and the politics of cultural practice.

How do we imagine madness and the mad? And why do we constantly do so? Lurking behind and often within our stereotypes of those who see the world differently is a sense of the potential fragility of our own psyche. This extensive and impressive set of studies of how and why, compiled by anna six, ranges from cinema to carnival, from stand-up comedy to serious fiction, from self-harm to schizophrenia and beyond. All the essays are substantial and reading through the volume we are able to tease out the subtle function of madness with its national and historical differences as well as the overarching similarities of madness in our own global media culture.

• Introduction, We, The Unquantifiable, anna six (University of Warwick, UK)Part One: Experiences: Anxiety, Despair, Mania, Altered States1. ‘Hangxiety’ in Contemporary Spanish Feminist Graphic Autofictions, Katie Salmon (Newcastle University, UK) 2. Shooting Dissolution: Charlie Kaufman and the Politics of Despair, anna six (University of Warwick, UK)3. Cinemania: Madness and the Moving Image, WJT Mitchell (University of Chicago, USA) 4. Laughing with the Mad, Spectating the Sane: Comedy, Madness, and the Early Modern Stage, Bridget Escolme (Queen Mary University of London, UK)Part Two: Events: Trauma, Grief, Self-Harm, Suicide5. A Tale of Two Traumatising Mothers: Individual and Political Madness in Caryl Phillips’ The Final Passage, Bénédicte Ledent (University of Liège, Belgium) 6. Deaths by Shooting: Disenfranchised Grief and the Contemporary Elegy, Anne Whitehead (Newcastle University, UK) 7. Representations of Self-Harm in Performance and the Everyday: Towards New Contracts with the Skin, Freya Verlander (University of Warwick, UK) 8. Playing with Suicide: Untimely Wanderings with Suicidality, Jon Venn (Independent Scholar, UK)Part Three: Environments: Asylums, Streets, Organisations, Atmospheres, Hospitals9. Viewing Virtually: The Topographical Asylum Print, Anna Jamieson (University of Birmingham, UK) 10. Madness and Female Role Performances on Stage: Kabuki and Mental Illness in Japan 1600-1800, Akihito Suzuki (University of Tokyo, Japan) 11. Organisational Madness, Patrick ffrench (King’s College London, UK) and Sinan Richards (University College Cork, Ireland) 12. Diagnosed with ‘Environmental Degradation’: Health, Pollution, and Environmental Sexism in Safe, Tatiana Konrad (University of Vienna, Austria) 13. (Re) Making Space: Young People, Mental Health, and Scenographic Agency, Amy Skinner (York St John University, UK)Part Four: Expertise: Diagnosis, Treatment, Therapy, Recovery, Resistance14. Authenticity and Representations of Mental Health in Popular Visual Media: Schizophrenia, Dementia Praecox, and Hollywood 1940-1960, Kevin Jones (University of Nottingham, UK) 15. Art as an Alternative Philosophy of Care in Mental Distress, Karin Jervert (Independent artist, USA) 16. Notes on Therapy, Kim Noble (Independent artist, UK) 17. Stand-up Comedy as Recovery Narrative, Matt Hargrave (Northumbria University, UK) 18. An Interview with Robert Whitaker, anna six (University of Warwick, UK)Part Five: Enfoldings: Families, Carers, Communities, Spirits19. When Madness Matters: The Limits and Affordances of Representing Madness in Contemporary Biopics of Historical Royal Women, Veronica Heney (Durham University, UK) and Francesca Lewis (University of York, UK) 20. Community Care Gothic: The Madness of Saint Maud, Leah Sidi (University College London, UK) 21. Less Ritalin and More Glitter: Re-shaping Recovery Through Carnival, Julia Evangelista (Independent Researcher, Brazil) 22. Curating Madness: Suicidality and the Spirit in Between, Tiara Raven Marie Clover (Emory University, USA)