Bibliography Packet Two

Bibliography
Packet Two
Nicole Ponsler
October 6, 2008

ARTAUD, ANTONIN, ed. Sontag, Susan. Antonin Artaud: Selected Writings. University of California Press, 1988.

This book reviews selected poetry of French poet, Artaud Antonin. Many of his poems address his assertion that madness and the artist are inextricably enmeshed.

BERRYMAN, JOHN. Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews. Viking Press, 1976.

This compilation includes the writing of Theodore Roethke. In particular, Roethke’s writing addresses the notion of artist and adversity and how adversity actually works in the artists’ favor. I will offer my favorite quote:

What madness but nobility of soul

At odds with circumstance…

The edge is what I have

BECKER, GEORGE, The Mad Genius Controversy: A Study in the Sociology of Deviance. Sage Publications, 1978.

Becker explores the link between genius artists and their link to psychological disorders. In particular, Becker describes the beginning of the Romanticism movement, wherein the expression of emotion, movement and erratic compositions became commonplace for the first time in the history of art.

CARUTH, CATHY. Trauma: Explorations in Memory. John Hopkins University Press, 1995.

This is a compilation of essays complied to address trauma, memory, how trauma affects generations and how trauma can instruct. I have only read articles by Cathy Caruth, Shoshana Felman and Henry Krystal so far. These readings discuss the pedagogy of trauma as well as trauma and aging.

FELMAN, SHOSHANA, “Education and Crisis, or the Vicissitudes of Teaching”, Trauma: Explorations in Memory. John Hopkins University Press, 1995.

This article discusses artists’ testimony, the role of the audience and the necessity of truth-telling through testimony. Felman argues that trauma testimony should be integral in the pedagogy of teaching as the individual’s creative response to trauma can be instructive in terms of establishing a discernable place and time to said event. Felman explains her own hands-on experience with teaching poetry inclusive of artistic testimony.

JAMISON, KAY REDFIELD. Touched with Fire. Free Press Paperbacks, 1994.

Touched with Fire examines the relationship between manic-depressive illness and artistic temperament. Redfield provides data demonstrating the link between artistic expression and manic disorders, including cyclothymia, manic-depression and bipolar disorder. Redfield presents her thesis form the stand-point that artists who have manic disorders are gifted, rather than handicapped.

KRYSTAL, HENRY. “Trauma and Aging”, Trauma: Explorations in Memory. John Hopkins University Press, 1995.

Krystal researches Holocaust survivors for decades, describing coping mechanisms enlisted by those victims. He describes a grief limit, wherein survivors may never be able to assimilate the magnitude of their trauma. Overall, the essay addresses the elder person’s reckoning with how they spent their lives and how this acknowledgement can cause despair should the person not have been able to cope with certain life traumas.

MILES, JONATHAN. “The History of the First History Painting” Art News, pg.112, May 2008.

This article comes from this month’s ArtNews where Miles reviews a new book written about The Raft of the Medusa and Gericault. Miles describes the history of the first history painting, while introducing elements of Gericault’s personality that make his work so unique and innovative.

RUSKIN, JOHN. Modern Painters. Wiley & Halsted, 1857.

Ruskin, one of the first and perhaps the most famous Art Historians, explores the relationship between art and madness. Ruskin himself was believed to have experienced psychological issues, perhaps relating to manic-depression. I was interested in Ruskin’s description of divergent thinking that is represented in artists, particularly those with manic disorders.

WEISEL, ELIE. Dimensions of the Holocaust. Northwestern University Press, 1977.

Weisel examines why testimony has become so central to our recent cultural accounts. She determines that “the Greeks invented tragedy, the Renaissance the sonnet, and our generation invented the testimony”. Weisel continues to explore what the significance of the growing predominance of testimony means in contemporary society.

ZIMMERMAN, J., GARFINKLE, L. “Preliminary Study of the Art Productions of the Adult Psychotic”, Psychiatric Quarterly, 16 (1942): 313-318.

These two psychiatrists outline some of the characteristics found in works of art created by people with all manner of psychological impairment. Specific to my research, they enumerate formal and compositional qualities present in paintings created by artists displaying manic-depressive disorder.