Sounds of the Bell Jar

This groundbreaking work is a unique collaboration between an Oxford University psychologist and two literary critics. It explores the lives and works of 10 authors - among them Virginia Woolf and Sylvia Plath - who embody both serious mental illness and great originality of thought. The book draws upon personal diaries, historical archives, clinical records and literary productions, and examines modes of thinking - such as divergent thought, over-inclusiveness and autism - that psychosis and creativity might have in common. Using genetics, experimental abnormal and clinical psychology, personality research, descriptive psychiatry and literary analysis, Claridge, Pryor and Watkins present the revolutionary idea that normality and psychosis are continuous with each other. Healthy varieties and styles of thought and perception substantially overlap with the inclination toward psychotic breakdown and, indeed, might at times be identical. Psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors, therapists and general readers will gain a deeper understanding of the relationship between madness and creativity from this book.