Styron's Memoir

Styron~{!/~}s memoir of madness--Darkness Visible

Manic depression, as a mental illness that causes anguish in human beings in a extremely persistent and devastating way, has taken a great number of artists~{!/~} and writers~{!/~} lives. Having been severely tortured by such illness, Williams Styron finally survived and continued his life journey with great appreciation.

In the form of memoir, Darkness Visible allows readers to observe the mental anguish and unimaginable depression that strips a person of every vestige of self-esteem. Remarkably, Darkness Visible is not a depressing but a salutary work that uplifts with its sense of catharsis, offering a probing look at an illness that affects millions but is still widely misunderstood.

Styron, from his experience, reports: ~{!0~}But the wisest books among them underscore the hard truth that serious depressions do not disappear overnight. All of this emphasizes an essential though difficult reality which I think needs stating at the outset of my own chronicle: the disease of depression remains a great mystery.~{!1~} With such experience, the author owns a profound understanding of the disease and is willing to share his story to discover the mystery and break the misunderstanding.

Primo Levi, an Italian writer, killed himself while suffering from mental illness. In an article in The New York Times, many writers and scholars were mystified and disappointed by Levi~{!/~}s suicide.

~{!0~}It was as if this man whom they had all so greatly admired, and who had endured so much at the hands of Nazis~{!*~}a man of exemplary resilience and courage~{!*~}had by his suicide demonstrated a frailty, a crumbling of character they were loath to accept. In the face of a terrible absolute~{!*~}self-destruction~{!*~}their reaction was helplessness and a touch of shame.~{!1~}

Since the author has suffered mental illness, he then came forward and anxiously clarified for all victims: ~{!0~}The argument I put forth was fairly straightforward: the pain of severe depression is quite