For the Melancholic Dreamers

“We are possibly not far away from eradicating a major cultural force, a serious inspiration to invention, the muse behind art and poetry and music. We are wantonly hankering to rid the world of numerous ideas and visions, multitudinous innovations and meditations. We are right at this moment annihilating melancholia." 

- Eric G. Wilson, Against Happiness: In Praise of Melancholy 

For the Melancholic Dreamers

Artistic expression of melancholy enriching our creativity

"I thought how strange it had never occurred to me before that I was only purely happy until I was nine years old."

- Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar 

Humans have been sad. The art they produce has been sadder. From Rey singing about her loneliness to Dazai, staining his paper with his experiences of detachment, the art of melancholy has existed before and beyond its artists. Aristotle questioned Melancholy as a characteristic of genius; “Why do people who become eminent in Philosophy, Art or Poetry tend to be melancholic?.” The answer to this was traced back to Hippocrates; the four humours for the different personalities of humans. Black Bile had a connection with Melancholia. This explanation was accepted until it wasn’t. Years into philosophical development, the Age of Enlightenment enabled mankind to think about ourselves as individuals with reason. Views on Melancholy had shifted their base from the earlier opinions. Melancholy was seen to have been caused by a weak nervous system, coined as hysteric in some ways.

One must not forget to mention Immanuel Kant, a prominent thinker of the era, whose opinion on Melancholy differed from that of other thinkers. In his opinion, the melancholic was more open to the sublime. Friedrich Nietzsche also believed that a certain amount of suffering was essential for the soul. The father of angst, Soren Kierkegaard, viewed melancholy through two lenses simultaneously—Melancholy through a sin-theological point of view and as a part of the physical soul. Man must return to faith as anxiety results from this lack, according to the sin-theological view. A deep sense of existence characterises a person with a tendency to melancholy—they rise up again and again—driven by a longing for the lasting, the beautiful, an overcoming of death, as of all finiteness in general—and with their profound, metaphysical sense of reality has the strength, again and again, to dance along the great dance of the cosmos and to create something lasting through their works. For Kierkegaard, melancholy also existed because of the innate laws of nature within a person. Melancholy thus becomes not a sin, because it is a part of the physical body. There were further advancements after this. Heidegger helped us understand philosophical art in a new light through his concept of Melancholy. He did not mention character types or melancholy as a disposition, yet he referred to the Aristotelian question. He used the word Schwermut (dejection or gloom) in his works; melancholy was assumed to be the basic mood of Philosophy; by suppressing an emotion, we deprive ourselves of the potential to feel and create freely. Melancholia may not be a factor that always creates gloomy geniuses, but it is definitely seen to be too common in great minds. This lingering sense of sadness enriches the experience of creating, just like any other emotion. It is only glamourised, as much as it is, simply because it is usually suppressed so much— through false positivity. If we are witnessing a shift in extreme performative sadness (which can also raise concerns of being symptoms of Munchausen), then on the other side of the spectrum, one also simultaneously witnesses performative positivity. From Kierkegaard to Wilson, all believed that melancholy is a part of our being. It is the emptiness that is in itself a full part of our human-ness as long as we live. We thrive and fall when we experience the complexities of our soul raw.

To be able to feel tender and vulnerable, one must be allowed to feel the desolation and the angst. The havoc in one’s heart creates the most fragile piece of art.

"I am a dreamer. For a dreamer is one who can find his way by moonlight, and his punishment is that he sees the dawn before the rest of the world."

- Oscar Wilde

For the Melancholic Dreamers, who thrive when they are the only creatures in their room, their art becomes cathartic. As poets, artists, or people in their own heads, they outlive their bodies through their creation. Existence grips a soul so tight that the only way out is to write.

Sources :

1. Moritz René PRETZSCH, Philosophy and melancholy: Reflections on the role of melancholy in Kierkegaard’s and Heidegger’s philosophical thought
2. Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
3. Osamu Dazai, No Longer Human, Maria Popova, In Praise of Melancholy and How It Enriches our Capacity for Creativity

Author

Aarushi Maithil (2nd Year) BA Hons. Philosophy