Composers Suffering from Mental Illness

[pies]

I enjoyed derailing this thread. 

[cloches_de_geneve]

I enjoyed derailing this thread. 

I don't think you derailed it; you just seem to see homosexuality as a form of mental illness.

[minor9th]

I enjoyed derailing this thread.  

Well, bravo to you, ***hole. I'm sure we can return the favor...

[ahinton]

I am quite sure that this thread can continue perfectly satisfactorily by road, whether Rzewski's or otherwise, rather than rail, whether Ives's celestial one or otherwise; what "pies" may choose to try to do to it would therefore seem to be of little consequence, unless he happens to confess to being one of the compoers in the firing line here...

Best,

Alistair

[fhertzbe]

Interestingly, almost all of the below were Romantics. As Nietszsche would have said, Romanticism was a malady in itself ...

Well-documented cases:

Schumann (psychosis, attempted suicide, hospitalized)
Schubert (depression due to Syphilis, likely alcoholism, not hospitalized)
Bruckner (obsessive-compulsive disorder, obsessed with counting everything he saw or thought or heard, hospitalized)
Rachmaninoff, extended bout of depression (underwent psychoanalytic treatment)
Donizetti (psychosis due to syphilis, hospitalized)
Mahler (consulted Freud for sexual erectile dysfunction)
Hugo Wolf (psychosis, due to syphilis, hospitalized; went around the streets of Vienna proclaiming: "I am Mahler!" "I am Mahler"!)
Mussorsky (alcoholism)
Ravel (brain malfunction)

Probable:
Tschaikovsky, extended bouts of depression, possible suicide
Chopin, generalized anxiety disorder?
Wagner, narcissitic personality disorder?


Of interest: Dozens of writers and poets committed suicide. To my knowledge very few if any of the better known composers. Why would that be?

 

[go12_3]

Interestingly, almost all of the below were Romantics. As Nietszsche would have said, Romanticism was a malady in itself ...

Indeed so, and no real treatment to make them deal with their conditions.

[ahinton]

Well-documented cases:

...
Ravel (brain malfunction)

That is pretty indecently unfair to Ravel, whose health problems did not afflict him until he had accomplished almost all of the work for which we know him; I'm not in any sense undermining what happened to him or its effect upon him (and he died far younger than otherwise he might have done), but it is unreasonable to claim that this affliction affected any material amount of his output.

Best,

Alistair

[lontano]

Me.

[gyzzzmo]

I suppose many artists are very emotionally sensitive compared to normal people. I think thats also a requirement for being a great composer/artist.
That compared to all the stress that comes with performing, managing finances and 'politics' is a pretty potential unhealthy combination. These days people have alot of managers around them and in most countries, social security. And suicide is still seen as a 'romantic' ending of a true artists' life.

[lmiller2501]

I don't even need to pretend to read the posts...  they are all DYING to be CRAZY...  interpret that how you would like...

[john11inc]

I think the title of this thread should simply be renamed "Composers".

[ahinton]

I think the title of this thread should simply be renamed "Composers".

A category term sometimes used by Sorabji (albeit not, I think, without at least part of his tongue in at least one of his cheeks) was "composers and other lunatics"...

Best,

Alistair