"My madness saved me" : the madness and marriage of Virginia Woolf
"The vast literature on Virginia Woolf's life, work and marriage falls into two groups. A large majority is certain that she was mentally ill, and a small minority is equally certain that she was not mentally ill but was misdiagnosed by psychiatrists. In this daring exploration of Woolf's life and work, Thomas Szasz examines the evidence and rejects both views. Instead, he looks at how Virginia Woolf, as well as her husband Leonard, used the concept of madness and the profession of psychiatry to manage and manipulate their own and each other's lives." "Szasz argues that Virginia Woolf was a victim neither of mental illness, nor psychiatry, nor her husband - three ways she is regularly portrayed. He finds her to be an intelligent and self-assertive person, a moral agent who used mental illness, psychiatry, and her husband to fashion for herself a life of her own choosing. Szasz interprets Virginia Woolf's life and work as expressions of her character, and her character as the "product" of her free will."--Jacket
Print Book, English, ©2006
Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, N.J., ©2006
Biography
xv, 154 pages ; 24 cm
9780765803214, 0765803216
61200762
Chronology, Dramatis Personae, Abbreviations, Preface, 1. “Whatever we are to call it”, 2. “In the head you know”, 3. “He shut people up”, 4. “My madness saved me”, 5. “A screwed up shrunk very old man”, 6. “He will go on, better without me”, 7. “He’s got a finger in my mind”, Appendix I: Virginia Woolf, Mad Genius, Appendix II: The Mad Genius Problem, Notes, Bibliography, Acknowledgments, Index