Neurosis and the Artist Notes

In 1941, Edmund Wilson published The Wound and the Bow, presenting a thesis about art and the artist.
The title refers to the Greek warrior Philoctetes, isolated due to a wound's stench but valued for his unerring bow.
Wilson's thesis assimilates the artist to Philoctetes.
The thesis suggests the artist suffers and possesses special gifts, advocating for considering the artist's entire personality.
Wilson asserts, 'Genius and disease, like strength and mutilation, may be inextricably bound up together.'
A stronger interpretation suggests the artist's gifts stem from their suffering; their art is their sickness. This echoes the Romantic view of the artist.
This stronger thesis connects with the ambivalent feelings art evokes and gains authority from psychoanalytic thought.

The article then shifts to Freud's perspective on the relationship between art and neurosis.
Freud consistently rejected the thesis that art is neurosis. Discussions in the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society reveal this.
In response to Wittels's paper on 'the Fackel-Neurosis' (Karl Kraus), Freud stated: 'We forget too easily that we have no right to place neurosis in the foreground, wherever a great accomplishment is involved' (12 January 1910).
Regarding Sadger's paper on Kleist, Freud questioned the value of pathography of artists, suggesting it focuses on abnormalities without truly illuminating the creative process.
Freud believed that exploring the connection between genius and disease should lead to a revised understanding of the disease itself, not of the art.
He argued that traits that might be pathological in others could be benign in a creative context.
Freud cited Schiller as an example of an artist who exemplified normality.

Addresses why the idea of art as neurosis became associated with Freud, despite his denials.
Explains the misinterpretation arises from infelicity of expression and inattention to text.
Freud's essay 'Creative Writers and Day-Dreaming' is often cited, but it refers to a specific kind of popular literature, not 'high' art.
The article then introduces three interconnected points in Freud's work:
- Distinction between neurosis (a structured constellation of desires, beliefs, and dispositions) and being neurotic (a matter of degree).
- The elements constituting neurosis are present in all individuals to varying degrees, representing a fixation at a stage of psychological development.
- Freud's tendency to focus on the content of artworks and trace it back to hidden desires or beliefs of the artist.
Freud used art to illustrate fragments of developmental theory (e.g., Leonardo da Vinci, Dostoevsky) or to demonstrate the universality of psychoanalytic principles (Jensen's Gradiva).
The author explains why these three points might misleadingly suggest a path from art to neurosis like this: work of art to hidden wish; hidden wish to constituents of neurosis; and constituents of neurosis to neurosis itself.
However, this reasoning omits the formal elements of art and the importance of the intensity and inflexibility of a wish in causing neurosis.

Freud argued that art is not identical with neurosis but incompatible with it.
The artist's ability to shape 'neurotic' material into an engaging form indicates that the material is not pathologically strong, that the ego can contain it.
The capacity to manipulate hidden wishes demonstrates freedom from neurosis.
This aligns with Freud's idea that the neurotic repeats what they cannot recall, while recall implies freedom and the ability to make sense of things.

The discussion shifts to the idea of art as therapy, questioning whether artistic creativity can free one from neurosis.
While art therapy has practical applications, its theoretical basis is weak.
The article questions the logic of thinking that creating art will prevent madness, pointing out the lack of a clear conception of what constitutes art in this context.
In art therapy, art is defined through therapy, reversing the original premise.
The thesis of art as therapy has a blurred conception of art.

The article poses a question: Can the fact that artistic creativity signals freedom from neurosis be used to define essential features of art?
The hope is to find a correspondence between ego's control over desires/beliefs and artistic manipulation.
The article raises the problem of finding the definition of artistic expression that can cause therapy. It is difficult to determine the line between mechanical and the true artistic expression.
The inherently institutional aspects of art make completing such a program in detail impossible.
The integration of mental processes and formal properties of art cannot be mechanically formulated or reduced to a 'dictionary' of symbolism.
Correspondence cannot be learned then practiced, instead they must be created by every significant artist.
The example of Marion Milner's On Not Being Able to Paint displays this truth.

Yvor Winters coined the phrase 'the fallacy of imitative form' to critique the idea that states of mind can directly express themselves in compositional features of art.
Winters argued that Shakespeare's later Macbeth speeches are bad poetry because Shakespeare tried to express internal confusion with broken meter and syntax.
Winters is criticized for assuming fixed rules for expressing mental states through form.
Edgar Wind critiqued Picasso's Guernica using Winter's argument claiming the artist tried to express inner torment through tormented forms; the assessment must be based on the artwork itself.

The article concludes by reflecting on the cultural and organizational forces influencing contemporary art.
The author notes that Freud's thought evolved in a different cultural context, and many of his assumptions are now questioned.
The massive commercialization and bureaucratization of art have led to a disturbing situation.
Freud couldn't have foreseen the extent to which commercial and bureaucratic interests would promote an illusionary art.
The author suggests that vulgarized notions of the artist's sickness have contributed to the sickness of art itself. Overall, the article is a philosophical exploration of the complex relationship between neurosis and art, and therapy.