Kaiten Soshi

…ression, my role models weren’t people who recovered, but artists who eventually killed themselves. My friends, who I now recognize were not in an easy position, would offer sordid reassurances like, “David Foster Wallace was depressed, and he turned it into books. Why don’t you write again?” It’s cruel to suggest that a sick person do the labor of a famous working artist, and even more cruel when the suggestion hinges on an artist who hung himself. There is nothing romantic about being sick, and I suspect that if Sylvia Plath or Kurt Cobain ever worked for even a second in the throes of a depressive episode, then their output is an exception, not a rule. I remember shooting the depressiongrams with a sense of purpose, like if I couldn’t fulfill my duty…