Madman

Diary, today the term is generally used for personal diaries and normally keep private or have limited circulation among special populations. The short story, Diary of a Madman by Nikolai Gogol used the diary format as the genre of book. Diary of a Madman is written by Gogol in 1834, subsequently was published in the collection Arabesques with the title Shred of Notes of a Madman in 1835(May 2004). This book is informative and insightful; it refers to many aspects. The story not only can be considered as a satire to the social hierarchy but also be discussed by many people as an oeuvre about the symptoms of schizophrenia. From my options, Gogol is more focused on the description of schizophrenia. Gogol wrote this short story in the first person, he desires that the readers can experience Poprishchin’s mental disintegration firsthand. In addition to using the first person, Gogol also uses dogs, Spain and date of dairy as literacy motifs and metaphors to depict the central character Poprishchin who is schizophrenic in the novella.

Gogol wrote the Diary of a Madman in the first person to avoid the mitigating influence of an external narrator; Gogol uses this way to focus the readers’ attention on the central character Poprishchin who gradually descents into madness under the society in mid-nineteenth century of Russian. Poprishchin is a middle-aged man who has ameaningless occupation of sharpening the pens for his director and copying the information from the office to another office. Until one day, Poprishchin notices that he can hear the conversations between the dogs and he thinks that’s normal things. He longs to the woman Sophie who is the daughter of his director, subsequently, he asked his daughter’s dogs to scoop more information about Sophie. What is worse is that Poprishchin fantasies he is the king of Spain. His diary started losing the chronological time for his diary. This little clerk is treated without kindness and courtesy, “I have not the strength to endure it any longer”, finally Poprishchin becomes madness and ends his diary(Gogol Diary of A Madman).

Poprishchin’s symptoms of schizophrenia begin with the auditory hallucinations. He can hear the conversation between the dogs and believes such inconceivable things can happen. Gogol uses the dogs as a symbol to represent the development of the narrator’s schizophrenia. There are several sentences from Diary of a Madman wrote:

I have long suspected dogs of being far more intelligent than human beings; I was convinced that they had the gift of speech, only they are singularly obstinate. They are great politicians: they notice everything, one’s every step(Gogol 7).

Sometimes, we would wonder if the dogs could speak, what would they say or how smart are they? We all have such fantastic illusions sometimes; there is nothing unusual about that. Compared to us, Poprishchin is in a totally different situation. Poprishchin does not stop in the level where common people approach. He starts to hallucinate and does not know what to make of it. After this madman Poprishchin thinks the thoughts he has is usual suspicions, he uses two cases about a fish and two cows were reported from the different parts of the world to rationalizes his hallucinations(Gogol). Such actions of Poprishchin is similar to the article written by Vegeley:

The property of “being mental” correlates with the availability of previous events or representations, thus with memory. This gives the opportunity to memorize and to re-identify, thus to orient ourselves successfully in the world(Vegeley 637)

This evidence can show that Poprishchin uses the cases he heard before, then reorganize these cases and find a normal way to explain his unnormal hallucinations. In other words, he does not recognize the mental illness he has, he thinks the dogs can speak is such normal things.  From the social level, the dogs symbolize the upper-class women; from the psychical level, the dogs are the symbols of schizophrenic. The dogs are the literacy motifs the author employed to represent the mental disorders of the character Poprishchin.

In addition to using the dogs as literacy motifs, Gogol also refers to Spain to demonstrate the madness of Poprishchin. With the deterioration of  Poprishchin’s symptom, he starts to lose the train of his thoughts and appears the delusion. The knowledge of Spain breaks in his mind, Poprishchin wrote in his diary:

I HAD quite decided to go to the Department, but various reasons and meditations prevented me from doing so. I can’t get the affairs of Spain out of my head […] I confess that all these events have so overwhelmed and shaken me that whole day I was unable to do any work. Mavra made remarks on my absent-mindedness at the table. Indeed, it would seem that I threw two plates on the floor, whereupon they got smashed(Gogol 13).

The affairs about Spain invade Poprishchin’s mind, he cannot think or do anything else. Schizophrenia is not only giving him hallucinations, but also take his own thoughts away and occupy his brain. Indeed, Poprishchin cannot remember that he threw the smashed plates and his absent-mindedness at the table. The narrator uses “seem”, this word can prove that he could not notice these things happened if maid Mavra didn’t remark him.

Such happens just as a start, subsequently, with the next diary, the narrator wrote: “Spain has a King. He has been discovered. I am that King. It was only to-day I found it out. The revelation came to me like a flash of lightning”(Gogol 13). We can actually know Poprishchin is a real madman at this time. This madman images he is the King of Spain, he uses one whole day to get this fake information. This unknown “fact” just like the light for Poprishchin, he wrote this part of diary with passive tone. The fact is that Poprishchin did the finding by himself and thinks he is that King. Gogol uses the part about Spain to show that Poprishchin really becomes insane at that moment.

From the aspects of psychosis, the delusions are usually regarded as the symptoms of schizophrenia which are harmful to human beings. There is a research about the delusions can play a protective role, the article wrote that: “There is a real and pragmatic benefit to this ‘voice hearing’ or ‘telepathic’ experience. Alison was enormously relieved that someone believed her and this prevented her from taking an overdose of prescription medication. (Gunn, Bortolotti 6.3)” Compare to Alison’s relax under the help with the delusions, Poprishchin also feel satisfied with the new identity. Alison can stop taking the pills with this delusional help, thus the delusions play a protective role. However, Poprishchin is trying to escape from such a society, there is nothing helpful to his schizophrenia. The behaviors of Poprishchin still are schizophrenic. Another difference between these two cases is that the treatment at that time is not similar to the new treatment nowadays.

There are several limited treatments for patients with schizophrenia in the middle

nineteenth century of Russia. There have only some ways like locking away the patients, give physical abuse to those patients in the lunatic asylum. Before the 1980s, the treatment of psychopathology generally is drug and surgical operation. Surgery is to lobotomy which is cruel to patients, the patients would lose all the perception and continue living with a shell of the body, unlike a person. Fortunately, there have many available ways for schizophrenic patients. The drugs for schizophrenia are frequently approaching by the times. Nowadays, the drugs can be used as a new treatment option in generic form. There is an introduced for this new drug quetiapine:

An anti-psychotic drug, quetiapine treats the symptoms of schizophrenia. Quetiapine is also used alone or with other medications to treat or prevent episodes of mania or depression in patients with bipolar disorder. Quetiapine may be used as part of a treatment program to treat bipolar disorder and schizophrenia in children(FDA).

The treatment options were different to the character then and now. However, if Poprishchin was not born in that period, he would not be schizophrenic. The main reason causes he becomes a madman is under that social hierarchy.

The character Poprishchin from Diary of a Madman is obviously regarded as a madman. The novella normally is discussed as an exhibit with all the symptoms characteristic of schizophrenia. The author Nikolai Gogol uses many literacy motifs and metaphors to depict the character Poprishchin who has mental disorders. He has the symptoms of schizophrenia-like hallucinations, delusions and losing the train of thoughts. The madman can hear the voices from dogs. Later, his brain is occupied by the affairs of Spain and finally, the images that he is the King of Spain. The society is one major reason that causes narrator gradually descends to insanity. Poprishchin is a typical character with schizophrenia.

 

 

Works Cited

Melnyk, Anastasia . “Diary of a Madman Background”.

GradeSaver, 29 March 2016 Web.

12 November 2018.

“The Diary of a Madman – Summary” Comprehensive Guide to Short Stories, Critical

Edition Ed. Charles E. May. eNotes.com, Inc. 2004 eNotes.com 12 Nov, 2018

Vogeley, Kai. “Hallucinations Emerge From an Imbalance of Self-Monitoring and Reality

Modelling.” The Monist, vol. 82, no. 4, 1999, pp. 626–644. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/27903659.

Gunn, R. & Bortolotti, L. Phenom Cogn Sci (2018) 17: 813.

 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-017-9555-6

Drug that treats symptoms of schizophrenia available for first time as a generic 

https://www.fda.gov/Drugs/ResourcesForYou/SpecialFeatures/ucm299872.htm