Ce matin, Franck proposes to me to watch the face of the loup-garou, a simulacre of metamorphosis, for which I compare, which I grasp the experience of the peur, for me to prove that there is no sais quoi, sa Folie ou le contraire. I'm in the room, I have a chair, I have a face with my air focus and a change in expression, my eyes are fixed exorbitantly, I have a trembler, crisp machine, retrousse ses babies, sort les crocs, serre les dents à s'en faire péter l'émail, souffle et crache, cela dure, je soutiens faiblement son regard, il insiste, sa veine temporale qui palpite, le rouge qui monte au front. Puis Franck s'arrête net, rigole, satisfait de sa performance – alors, t'as flippé?
If you see Franck, you don't have to do it. Si tu simules la bête c'est que tu es homme. The assembly is instantaneous and the foil is the reason. Que tu sais exactement où tu te tiens, peut-être ni d'un bord ni de l'autre, ni dément ni sage, quand moi je ne sais plus rien, léger vertige. Je crois que tu m'as youre Franck.
When I ask the doctor to pour out the facial expressions of their expressions, their contrasts, their grimaces and inquiétants parfois, they pour out the facial muscles, the muscles that lower the lower arm and the muscles that increase the angle of the bouche are contracted in the pressure, the question is answered naive. Parfois, dans la rue, je croise ces regards noirs, accusateurs, ces pupilles fixes, ces sourires crispés ou ironiques, je perçois les spasmes, les nerfs sous the peau électrique, je vois la pâleur de la colère et j'imagine des tempêtes crâniennes, la souffrance tapie sous l'os frontal, je pense à tout ce qui sourd à l'intérieur, quand le médecin évoque tout ce qui s'abat depuis l'extérieur. Car la folie détruit toutes les protections, all les filtres, all remparts quiennent le monde à distance, en respect, qui instaurent entre nos corps et la réalité une sorte de zone tampon, un périmètre de sécurité et de pudeur – quelques centimètres peuvent suffire, a brassée d'air, a souffle.
When I ask you what you think, the doctor responds to you that the reality is in the middle. The plus small parcel of matière fond sur lui comme une météorite en fire, a goutte de pluie est d'acide, a poussière du poison, a coup d'œil and coup de poignard. Rien ne le protection, tout fait violence, les traits are deformed sous l'impulsion d'une parole anodine ; The world, the other things, the colors and the movements are always visible on the rouge on the plan in the face of the face. The doctor explains that the psychotics are similar to the continuation of the microtraumatisms. The light of the lights on the eyes, the sound of the lights on the tympans sounds, this is a phenomenal fracture in the two pores. Tout ce qui advient et entre dans leur champ de perception est vécu comme une commotion, une meurtrissure - une cuillère qui tombe, un enfant qui hoquette, peut-être this mouche qui se pose sur le mur. Without any defense, without the ability to resist so much, there is a sort, there is a jail, there is an action, there is no evidence of the attack, there is no trie past, there is no separation from the good grain l'ivraie, c'est à prendre ou à laisser, this hyperexpressivité, this augmentation de tout, ce bouleversement perpétuel.
Certainly dissent from Franck and from all other people who are perdent le réel, qu'ils perdent le contact, quand c'est l'inverse. The plutôt excès de réel, ils en crèvent de ce réel trop proche, trop fort, trop grand, qui leur colle aux basques et au cerveau.
Joy Sorman, A la folie (Flammarion, 2021).
This morning, Franck suggests showing me his werewolf face, a mock metamorphosis, so I'll understand, so I'll experience fear, so he can prove to me, I don't know, his madness or the opposite. He takes me to his room, has me sit down, stands before me with a concentrated expression, and changes his look in a flash: his fixed eyes widen, he begins to tremble, tenses his jaw, curls his lips, bares his teeth until the enamel cracks, blows and spits. It takes a while; weakly, I meet his gaze. He insists, the vein in his temple throbs, a blush rises to his forehead. Then Franck stops, laughs, satisfied with his performance—so, have you gone crazy?
But Franck, if you pretend to be crazy, then you aren't. If you behave like an animal, then you're human. Right now, it seems as if you're feigning both madness and sanity. You know exactly where you stand, perhaps neither on one side nor the other, neither insane nor sane, while I know nothing anymore; I'm feeling slightly dizzy. I think you've got me, Franck.
When I ask the head physician why the faces of the mentally ill are so expressive, so contrasting, so grimacing, and sometimes disturbing, why the facial muscles, the lower lip muscles, and the levator medius contract so intensely, he considers my question naive. Sometimes I encounter these black, accusatory stares on the street, the fixed pupils, the strained or ironic smiles; I perceive the spasms, the nerves beneath the electrified skin; I see the pallor of anger and imagine storms raging in the skull, the suffering lurking beneath the brow ridge; I think of all that throbs inside, while the doctor speaks of all that floods in on him from the outside. Because madness destroys all protective mechanisms, all filters, all bulwarks that keep the world at a distance and in check, that establish a kind of buffer zone, a safe and protected area, between our bodies and reality – a few centimeters can be enough, a breath of air, a single breath.
When I asked the doctor who was crazy, he replied: "Crazy is the one who gets reality hit him full force. The tiniest piece of matter crashes down on him like a burning meteorite, a raindrop is acid, a speck of dust poison, a blink a dagger thrust. Nothing protects him, everything inflicts violence, his features contort at the impulse of a harmless word; the world, others, colors, and movements are branded directly onto the unprotected surface of his face as if with a red-hot brand. The doctor explained to me that psychotic people are constantly struck by microtraumas. The faintest light burns in their eyes, the slightest crackle ruptures their eardrums, there's a tremendous roar in their permeable minds. Everything that happens and enters their field of perception is experienced as a shock and an injury—a dropped spoon, a swallowing child, perhaps the fly landing on the wall." Always defenseless, often without the ability to repress, it comes out, it wells up, it bursts out, it speaks the naked truth, even if it is figments of the imagination; it does not sort, it does not separate the wheat from the chaff; you can take it or leave it, this hyperexpressivity, this exaggeration of everything, this constant agitation.
Some say of Franck and all the others that they are losing touch with reality, that they are losing contact with it, but it's exactly the opposite. It's more like an excess of reality; they are dying from this reality that is too close, too strong, too big for them, clinging to their feet and their brains. 1
This article is written in German and can be found at https://rentree.de. Automatic translations into English and French are available. English, French.
Notes- “‘On that day I understood what had troubled me. Perhaps less the sight of the pain, the irrationality, and the deprivation, than this struggle that never ends, neither after a year nor after twenty, despite the treatments that erode the will, and despite the feeling of defeat, it never dies; it is life that persists, that one can never bring to an end despite the isolation room and the high-dose injections. Everyone refuses, denies, rejects; no madness can finally break their resolve.”
Joy Sorman spent a year in ward 4B of a psychiatric hospital, collecting the words of people considered mentally ill and their caregivers. From these men and women with their damaged lives, the author has created a book in which Franck, Maria, Catherine, Youcef, Barnabé, and Robert are the unforgettable characters. To insanity is the novel of her imprisoned life.”>>>
