It is the image of the mad scientist, the accursed poet, the extravagant visionary.
The idea that a psychic imbalance would be the price to pay for activating neurons is not new: since Antiquity, Plato believes that geniuses are
"
outside themselves
"
.
But the link between creativity and madness reached its peak during the era of romanticism, when moods and more particularly melancholy were considered sources of inspiration.
History seems to be full of cracked figures: Rimbaud would have suffered from hallucinations, Balzac from manias, Munch from anguish, Einstein from a form of autism, Freud from narcissism, Baudelaire from dependence, Beethoven from depression, bipolarity would have havoc with Napoleon or Marie Curie.
And the geniuses of evil are not left out, like Stalin and his paranoia.
Does quick thinking lead to mental disorder?
Conversely, does it promote genius?
Or is this correlation a pure product of…
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