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.

Monday, September 21, 2015

“Losing Time” in Multiple Personality: The connection between Joyce Carol Oates’ The Lost Landscape and Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time

In multiple personality, some personalities are aware of each other, but others are not, and one personality will have a memory gap (amnesia) for the periods of time that the other personality has been out and in control.

Since most persons who have multiple personality do not know it, what do they make of their memory gaps? They often think of it as losing time. Occasionally, they lose time. No big deal.

But since many people with multiple personality do think of their memory gaps as “losing time,” a standard question to screen people for multiple personality is: Do you ever lose time? To persons without multiple personality, the question will seem silly. But persons who do have multiple personality may immediately know what you mean.

Thus, the title of Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time is a big neon sign announcing that Proust had multiple personality (see past posts).

Does “Lost” in the title of Oates’ memoir The Lost Landscape have the same implication? To find out, see my post on Joyce Carol Oates from earlier this month.
Posted by at

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.

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)