EDITOR’S NOTE: This story by LaPorte High School student Brittany Belkiewitz earned her the 2011 Christopher Iselman Writing Award for essay.
Indispensable Insanity
By Brittany Belkiewitz
Brittany Belkiewitz
In the midst of the twilight hour, a patient is snatched from the comfort of his covers and strapped onto a gurney. His futile screams of protest echo through the psychiatric ward, escalating to a hysterical pitch. Casually, the attending nurse wheels her convulsing charge into the operating room, exchanging a nod with the stern, bespectacled doctor. As the gleaming scalpel looms ever closer, the man strains against the iron manacles that hold him prisoner. A fish out of water, he struggles for breath in the sterile atmosphere. The maniac’s prayers are answered with a sharp jolt of electricity. Whiteness.
Bulging eyeballs and uncontrollable strands of saliva have dominated popular culture’s imagery of insanity. Initially, the term “insanity” evokes a negative vision of frothing lunatics and crazed sociopaths. The word originated circa 1560, according to www.etmyonline.com. It is a derivative of the Latin “insanus,” meaning “mad, insane, outrageous, excessive, or extravagant.” Although ultimately used to describe the condition of patients housed in mental institutions, usage later broadened to include the description of actions in 1842. Today, The Oxford English Dictionary defines insanity as, “a persistent derangement of the mind; dementia; extremeness.” However, this narrow denotation fails to capture the seductive sense of unpredictability and enticing creative appeal of insanity. Upon second evaluation, one realizes the full complexity of this psyche. Insanity cultivates inspiration and innovation.
Conceptual insanity generates new philosophies and theories. Around 400 B.C., an unknown astronomer hypothesized that, contrary to common belief, the earth was not flat. Instead, he blatantly declared, our planet was a spherical shape. At the time, the masses rejected the stargazer’s findings, dismissing the notion as utterly insane. Only now, twenty-five centuries later, has the world truly come to appreciate this anonymous madman’s philosophical genius.
Wartime insanity, which often leads to terrible injustice, propels the process of invention. In order for the U.S. to emerge victorious amidst the throes of World War II, President Truman made the drastic decision to fund development projects for nuclear weapons. Detonating two atomic bombs on Japanese soil, one in Hiroshima and the other in Nagasaki, murdered, maimed, and mutated millions within seconds. The far-reaching effects of this insanity have penetrated the lives of Japanese and American citizens even today, sixty-five years later. Nuclear weapons development has exploded, and new facets of science have been explored due to this wartime insanity.
And finally, creative insanity lends itself to inspiration. On the blank canvas of the mind, a lack of insanity is a deficiency of imagination. Artists have entertained eccentricities since the beginning of time, and many a prolific mind has been labeled “insane” simply because he indulges in unconventional artistry. Edgar Allan Poe, a premier American writer, was originally shunned for his queer tendencies and dark stories. The peculiar poet touched every lamppost he passed on impulse, and his grotesque fascination with everything macabre sickened even the most strong-stomached readers. Some of his most famous works include “The Cask of Amontillado,” “The Raven,” and “The Tell-Tale Heart.” In his private diary, Poe scribbled, “I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity!” One of our country’s greatest romantic authors understood that insanity is to creativity as oxygen is to the brain.
Mrs. Krentz, an art teacher at LaPorte High School, best explained this visionary insanity. “Artists have always flirted with ideas and images that stray away from what is ‘normal.’ Insanity is simply freedom from normal constraints!”
In its various forms, insanity stealthily permeates our society’s brainwaves. It is the true source of creativity and innovation. The public’s narrow perception of this term is disproved every day by innovative concepts, inventions, and masterpieces. Insanity is the pretty weed that invades an otherwise immaculate garden plot; although it is a foreigner among the logical, orderly rows of tulips, the gardener cannot bear to weed it out, for insanity completes the landscape.
