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.

Thursday, March 14, 2019


“Rabbit, Run” by John Updike (post 5): Rabbit Angstrom urges postpartum, sober, alcoholic wife to drink, to get her to have sex

When she does not do what he wants, he leaves home to be with a prostitute. His wife then gets very drunk, and accidentally drowns the baby in the bathtub.

Why do Rabbit and his wife act this way? No explanation is given, leaving the impression that they are just not very intelligent or emotionally mature.

And since the characters have no clear signs of multiple personality, the novel has little sense of psychological depth, and does not seem very literary.

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.