Writing Like a Madwoman
The first friend I made in Columbia University's MFA program wrote exclusively about serial killers.
This seemed mildly concerning, but he was hilarious, so I decided not to worry about it.
The second friend I made was my neighbor, a soft-spoken gay man from somewhere in the Midwest. Idaho, maybe. My memory of graduate school is oddly selective. I can remember workshop critiques from twenty years ago, but not where half my classmates were from.
What I remember clearly is that I arrived at Columbia believing I was a writer and left understanding how difficult that title is to earn.
My first year in graduate school was humbling.
The first professor I had told me my work wasn't emotionally authentic. At the time, I was devastated. I assumed she was right. Professors were supposed to know these things.
A year later, I showed the exact same chapter of my novel to my thesis advisor. He loved it.
Apparently, literature is not a science. Two intelligent people can read the same pages and arrive at completely different conclusions.
I had my first manic episode during that first year of graduate school. I was hospitalized for seven days. The reason they admitted me was that I was laughing hysterically and moving furniture around the lobby of my apartment building.
After I was released from the hospital, I was still manic and unable to write anything that felt good. My thoughts were racing too fast to settle into coherent prose.
While I was in that manic state, I wandered around New York City for hours. I shopped, window-shopped, and walked aimlessly through neighborhoods. At the time, it felt like I was searching for something. Looking back, I'm not sure what.
Eventually, the mania subsided. Then came the depression.
I had trouble getting out of bed. Most days, I managed to make it to class, but my writing suffered. I was lonely, too. Depression has a way of convincing you that isolation is preferable to human contact, even when it isn't.
It was a difficult year.
I went home that summer and gradually emerged from the depression. When I returned to Columbia for my second year, something had changed.
I started becoming more confident in my prose style. I found professors who believed in me. More importantly, I started believing in myself.
I made friends. I wasn't manic. I wasn't depressed. For the first time since arriving in New York, I felt like I could fully participate in my own life.
My writing started out good and got even better as the year progressed.
I began writing about my experiences with mental illness and spirituality. At the time, I was fascinated by the relationship between insanity and enlightenment. I wondered whether my breakdown had also been some kind of breakthrough.
I wasn't interested in neat answers. I was interested in the questions.
What exactly separates madness from revelation? Why do so many artists struggle with mental illness? Is suffering necessary for great art? Can a person be psychologically unwell and spiritually awake at the same time?
The honesty with which I explored these questions seemed to resonate with my fellow students. Many of the writers in my program were wrestling with their own mental health challenges, and I found myself writing more and more about the complicated relationship between suffering, creativity, and meaning.
Then, during my final year, I met the mentor who would change everything.
He was a white, British, gay man with a wicked sense of humor. More importantly, he appreciated mine.
One day, he told me that I had found my voice.
He described it as witty.
That may not sound like much, but it was exactly what I needed to hear.
Up until then, I had spent years trying to write like other people. Suddenly, someone I respected was giving me permission to sound like myself.
The funny thing is that he didn't actually give me my voice. It was already there.
He simply recognized it before I did.
After that, I started writing like a madwoman.
Not because I was manic.
Because I was finally free.
nina
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