Of course, there are lots of kinds of mental illnesses, and I tend to look at the phenomenon from the standpoint of evolutionary biology. It seems to me that some manic types have periods when their high energy levels allow them to make jumps into new domains of art or intellectual achievement, but the reason why everyone isn’t that way is that these people are often unstable, and as a result may become unhappy and suicidal. The evolutionary bottom line: if you’re dead, you can’t have children.

It’s a good thing that highly creative people exist, but the reality is that they are often sick, and may have to decide whether they prefer a creative life with highs and lows to a more stable, potentially boring life like the majority of the population, if the suitable medication or an alcohol substitute works for them.

I don’t believe in talking cures for serious artists. The choices are really medication or the focused pursuit of art, with the possibility of some combination of the two. One of the sub-issues is whether or not such a person will have the self-discipline to produce some decent art. This is important, because I don’t think much of anything of value comes from a lack of focus. Ideally, a mentally unstable artist would find a balance between absorption in her work and medicated control of the lows.

Finally, I can’t finish without the curmudgeonly statement that not all artists are created equal, and that some alcoholic American icons were never that good in the first place. I don’t rate Fitzgerald, Faulkner or Hemingway highly at all.