BASIC CONCEPTS

— When novelists claim they do not invent it, but hear voices and find stories in their head, they are neither joking nor crazy.

— When characters, narrators, or muses have minds of their own and occasionally take over, they are alternate personalities.

— Alternate personalities and memory gaps, but no significant distress or dysfunction, is a normal version of multiple personality.

— normal Multiple Personality Trait (MPT) (core of Multiple Identity Literary Theory), not clinical Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD)

— The normal version of multiple personality is an asset in fiction writing when some alternate personalities are storytellers.

— Multiple personality originates when imaginative children with normal brains have unassuaged trauma as victim or witness.

— Psychiatrists, whose standard mental status exam fails to ask about memory gaps, think they never see multiple personality.

— They need the clue of memory gaps, because alternate personalities don’t acknowledge their presence until their cover is blown.

— In novels, most multiple personality, per se, is unnoticed, unintentional, and reflects the author’s view of ordinary psychology.

— Multiple personality means one person who has more than one identity and memory bank, not psychosis or possession.

— Euphemisms for alternate personalities include parts, pseudonyms, alter egos, doubles, double consciousness, voice or voices.

— Multiple personality trait: 90% of fiction writers; possibly 30% of public.

— Each time you visit, search "name index" or "subject index," choose another name or subject, and search it.

— If you read only recent posts, you miss most of what this site has to offer.

— Share site with friends.

Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Correction: I do know one thing about Gillian Flynn, her admiration for Agatha Christie, whose real-life fugue made her the original “gone girl”

When I said in yesterday’s post that I don’t know anything about Gillian Flynn, I forgot she has said in interviews that Agatha Christie is her favorite mystery novelist. And as others have noted, the connection is significant, because Christie’s famous real-life fugue in 1926 made her, in a sense, the original “gone girl.”

Incidentally, another favorite mentioned by Flynn is Hitchcock’s “Psycho,” whose main character has multiple personality.

I have many past posts about Agatha Christie’s multiple personality. Search “Christie” in this blog to read those posts, including the ones that mention Flynn.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thank you for taking the time to comment (whether you agree or disagree) and ask questions (simple or expert). I appreciate your contribution.