creativity and psychosis

as god said, i want it all. so, if you want the greatest of all qualities, creativity, you have to forego your sanity, no less. to enjoy those moments of epiphany and the creative process, the most enjoyable thing on earth by far, you will have to be a little mad. cant help. and if you think that madness iss too great a price to pay for creativity, you just dont have it. have never felt it, never will . just step aisde brother, you dont belong here. as all those who create would know, once you ve felt it, your life belongs to it, you live for it and die for it. and for everyone, you think the creative process is not that big a deal, ask youself, what is sex? and who hates sex. so dont kid yourself

creativity sports two traits: laatent inhibition and fantasy proneness.both, unfortunately, have a strong positive correlation with certain psychosis. low Latent inhibition means that the guy has a strong subconcious. when a person has high LI,  and he stares at or experiences something, he is basically taking in everything, all the experience, all the features conciously. There is no scope for any other impressions to form. even if the guy stares at the stuff 1000 times, at whatever gap, he is always going to form the same impression. but if a guy with low LI, when he is experiencing something, he is absorbing a lot of the stuff subconciously. means, he is looking, but not looking, he is not looking at the purple door knob for instance. he is just looking at the purple colour. in his mind he is trying to fit in some shape, object, fitting to that purple colour. after a while, his subconcious would throw up the round doorknob and make it colourless. then he would try to fit colour to shape; opposite to what he was doing earlier. this is how creation works, you moronic unimaginative beings

the above process is evidence enough to realise that the creative process is extremely fantasy prone, your continually trying to fit imaginative things to one another.you think and you imagine, creating another world. enough said.

now the sacrifice. most of the people who are low LI and high fantasy prone are also sufferers from clinical depression, are obsessive. some are manic depressive.but while low LI and high fantsay proneness are also associated with mental illness, to conclude that creative people are psychotic is like concluding that all climbers are thieves, coz thieves climb.

see what we have to live with? depression, obsession, psycopathic behaviour. but let me tell you on behalf of all creative people, it is absolutely worth it. when you fit that purple square doorknob, its certainly worth the torture and even something to look forward to.. Something you would never understand, you grey polished round doorknob guy, you...

Richter-Rostropovich

twin greats: a cellist and a pianist (Richter) join together to create magic. I especially like the 2nd movement. Its so joyous and it has an uncanny relation to life. Whenever, life has been down and out and its the time for slog against multiple misfortune, somehow I could never make time for the 2nd movement of the 3rd sonata. But then, the clouds pass and you once again feel like the man you are. magically the fates conspire to create the perfect situation for the 3rd cellor sonata in A major to be played, by messers rostropovich and richter and immdediatly you know school is over. summers have arrived, its time to be mercurial again, exotic, everchanging and creative. lets take some risks, im sure its going to be fun, like it always has been.

Listen to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHrOHgbrtCw

suck.uk.com

Perfectly functional, understated and cute. Made from scraps and off-cuts. This classic wooden doorstop has just a touch of added mouse-like character without being too blatant. If objects are more useful, cheerful and altogether more friendly then people foster stronger relationships with them... and maybe slow down land fill.

Poor Mark! He has met a sticky end, a squishy end to be more precise, his floppy body trapped within the pages of your book, scrabbling to get out, all the while happily keeping your place. You know, keeping the page of that point in the story where the man gets crushed by a giant encyclopedia. Forget pressed flowers and old receipts, Mark is the future and what else will he do now he’s DEAD

Yes, that’s right it’s a giant pencil sharpener. But no it will not sharpen your giant pencils! This is for organising all your miscellaneous pens, pencils and other stuff without looking out of place amongst your other stationery related desk accessories.

poets who show you magic

Poets have the ultimate license; like a wizard’s wand. In our times of starched and ironed political correctness, any public figure raising a contentious issue is drawn and hung out to dry. But Thom Gunn, being a poet, could explore all dark issues like violence, sexuality, anti-social behaviour because he could coat it all under beautiful verse.

All great poets have great eyes. They can see things where no one else can or uncover hidden feelings which you didn’t know even existed.

An American poet who wrote on biker gangs, Italian paintings and sex among other things. The recurrent theme is difficult to understand but I think he wrote about human feelings. "Touch" on intimacy, "Trust" on that, "on the move" on violence, "Santa Maria del popolo" on human frailty. He also does explore nature but always nature through living eyes and not nature in isolation. In this also he was exploring human desire for freedom I think. So how we rate Thom Gunn?

Developing the earlier argument that a great poet has great eyes, well thats not enough. Even great scientists have great eyes but they are not poets, they are scientists. So a great poet also must have great art. I guess art is adding a beauty dimension to something. So greater the beauty dimension in a work of art, the purer art it is. Thats why Gauguin’s pink horses are so beautiful because they are so close to purity and so right in their environment even though they are pink. So does Thom Gunn have the eye and the purity?

eye: "he fingers the little privacies of those who acted as if there should be no privacy" from "trust" to describe the actions of a thief; or "you turn and hold me tightly, do you know who I am or am I your mother or the nearest human being to hold on to in a dreamed pogrom" from "touch".

purity: so can we find in Thom Gunn a line which content wise doesn’t mean anything or doesnt promise much but... very simply just sounds great. I guess "Waiting for when the sun an hour or less conveniently oblique makes visible" is a beautiful line which qualifies Thom Gunn for the status of a great poet.

Touch

My personal favourite: “Touch", why? Find out for yourself. No matter how much you analyze poetry, ultimately it is about feeling the complex feelings that great poetry always generates. Half known, half unknown and always intensely personal.

You are already
asleep. I lower
myself in next to
you, my skin slightly
numb with the restraint
of habits, the patina of
self, the black frost
of outsideness, so that even
unclothed, it is
a resilient chilly
hardness, a superficially
malleable, dead
rubbery texture.

You are a mound
of bedclothes, where the cat
in sleep braces
its paws against your
calf through the blankets,
and kneads each paw in turn.

Meanwhile and slowly
I feel a is it
my own warmth surfacing or
the ferment of your whole
body that in darkness beneath
the cover is stealing
bit by bit to break
down that chill.

You turn and
hold me tightly, do
you know who
I am or am I
your mother or
the nearest human being to
hold on to in a
dreamed pogrom.

What I, now loosened,
sink into is an old
big place, it is
there already, for
you are already
there, and the cat
got there before you,
it is hard to locate.
What is more, the place is
not found but seeps
from our touch in
continuous creation, dark
enclosing cocoon round
ourselves alone, dark
wide realm where we
walk with everyone.