Setting the River on Fire…

I feel very humbled to have received an acknowledgement in Kay Redfield Jamison’s new biography on poet Robert Lowell — one of my favorite American writers (and a confessional muse of mine). I’ve been an admirer of Kay’s work for decades (intrigued as I am with the intersections of the arts and “madness”), and I can’t wait to read her latest work — which is getting great reviews (such as in the New York Times and Washington Post). I was honored and happy to provide her with details and sources on the history of the treatment of mania and “madness” in Islam and the Middle East — a subject which I’ve been researching for several years for a book project of my own. I’m really looking forward to reading this comprehensive study of Robert Lowell’s life (including his psychiatric medical records). In the words of Lowell, “We are poor passing facts, warned by that to give each figure in the photograph his living name.”