- That was a fun read. It’s interesting to me that my favorite writers loved cocaine/amphetamines while my favorite musicians were junkies.
If you’ve ever dabbled in the arts it is extremely easy to be tempted down that path. Alcohol especially, considering its ubiquity.. but I agree with the article “… booze is a malicious, treacherous muse.”
- One reason that alcohol is so popular is that it is easily, legally obtainable, and a social drug, unlike (say) heroin, which this article seems not to mention (I may have missed it)and might have done less damage (look at the long-lived William S Burroughs).
by garethsprice
0 subcomment
- Good essay. In my own readings on art and artists, one overlap with substance abuse is that artists tend to be highly sensitive people - the type of people who are drawn to both creative pursuits and also to coping mechanisms like drinking to numb the over-stimulation.
So it is not so much that writing leads to alcoholism, so much as being the kind of person who is deeply sensitive to the world around them makes both of those activities appealing.
As heavily drinking becomes less socially acceptable, and people learn more about mental health and healthier coping mechanisms, I wonder if there will be less famously intoxicated public figures - and if art will be better or worse for it.
- I've often wondered, with a cohort (community/society) of people who do not discourage freedom of expression, how many great works would come to fruition, but instead one is held back and then set free by drugs...?
by david_shi
1 subcomments
- Interesting that there's not a single mention of cannabis, perhaps it's more of a musician's choice.
- I'm not sure it's the amount they drink, but the basic metabolic reality of aging. Everyone starts to feel it in their 30s and 40s. These writers just choose to keep drinking well past when anyone else would have slowed down or quit.
I feel like it's probably their lifestyles were not flexible enough to accommodate that kind of change without losing out on opportunities. The fear of death and stress of that life would make anyone work harder.
by vintagedave
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- > In fact, several have claimed they had little choice but to drink, and heavily at that, if they were to perform at their creative peak.” This is the most astonishing part: even if they were well aware of the carnage that drink was wreaking on their lives, many of them did not realize that, as their addiction progressed, their work actually became worse and worse, sometimes even to the point of rendering them completely silent.
This is the terrifying part. I can understand using alcohol to help write. But to do so, not realising that over time it numbed output...
The scary part is the lack of self-awareness, combined with the loss of valuable creation.
by xtiansimon
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- Puts me to mind a dear musician friend I lost to heroin (or those drugs related to its use, since the details of the death remain a mystery to all but the immediate family). Muse of musicians. Wicked substance.
- Feels like there's also a connection of being brilliant and thus tortured so they turn to the escape of self medication.
by strathmeyer
0 subcomment
- [dead]
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