Girl, Interrupted is a memoir written by Susanna Kaysen who was admitted to a mental institution as a young girl. She was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder due to some her “depressive” and “crazy” behavior. Throughout the memoir, we are able to see the realizations that Kaysen has regarding the treatment of young women and mental patients. She touches on some of the stigmatizations that she witnessed herself and of others around her. Some of her experiences surrounding her stay at the
simply non-conforming, as opposed to insane. In Susanna Kaysen’s Girl, Interrupted, this fine line between sanity and insanity is explored to great lengths. Through the unveiling of Susanna’s past, the reasoning behind her commitment to McLean Hospital for the mentally ill, and varying definitions of the diagnosis that Susanna received, it is evident that social non-conformity is often confused with insanity. When life becomes
Girl Interrupted is Susanna Kaysen 's memoir a series of recollections and reflections of her nearly two year stay at a residential psychiatric program at McLean Hospital in Belmont, Massachusetts. She looks back on it with a sense of surprise. In her memoir she considers how she ended up at McLean, and whether or not she truly belonged there. Each chapter focuses on one aspect of her experience. Founded in the late 19th century, McLean Hospital had been a facility for troubled members of wealthy
Reading: My Thoughts on Girl, Interrupted (9.2.15) For two years, Susanna Kaysen spent her life within the walls of McLean Hospital, confined on the grounds that she, among others, possessed a mental disorder that created a danger to herself and others. Published in 1993, her memoir, Girl, Interrupted, captured the strange reality of both living among the insane and the experience of dealing with one’s own mental illness. Organized as a series of loosely connected vignettes, Kaysen revisits her most
Girl, Interrupted, a memoir, written by Susanna Kaysen, got it’s name from a Vermeer painting. Kaysen relates the interruption of her life; being transmitted into a mental institution, to the girl in the painting interrupted by her music. Kaysen’s memoir discusses the lives of those she met there as well as her own. It provides an idealistic image of what it’s like to be a patient in a mental institution in the 1960’s. After a lengthy appointment with her doctor, Kaysen was admitted into McLean
The movie, “Girl, Interrupted” by Susanna Kaysen, offers an individual perspective on what it is like to live in a mental institution. As a troubled teenager, Susanna was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder, in which she disagreed with. Susanna parents and a family friend recommended her to admit herself into a mental hospital named Claymoore because she had overdosed on aspirin and vodka. Within, the 18 months that Susanna stayed in the mental hospital she came across many individuals
Character Analysis – Susanna Kaysen from Girl Interrupted This character analysis is based on the character, Susanna Kaysen (played by Winona Ryder), from the feature film ‘Girl Interrupted’ directed by James Mangold and distributed by Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. in 1999, Rated MA15+. The film is based on the true story of Susanna Kaysen’s time in a mental institution, set in the 1960s. Exploring Susanna Kaysen’s character through an interactional viewpoint, many psychological concepts
I recently read the insightful memoir Girl, Interrupted written by Susanna Kaysen and it brought me into the world of mental illness. Susanna was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder and she describes her thinking process and how her mind works. She explained how one of her thoughts could change into something else entirely. One part of her saw and thought about reality, but the other part of her saw imaginary things that her reality side had to compete against. It displays the fine line
The main focus of this extended essay is to identify and understand the interpretation Susanna Kaysen expresses about her mental health’s state throughout the book. During their teenage years, many people may face themselves with certain issues like the author did so I think that analyzing this book can be a very good way to help us understand more about aspects of mental health issues. I decided to choose this topic for my extended essay because I consider that this will help me know more about
Girl interrupted, is a biopic of a woman named Susanna Kaysen. Even though this movie was about Susanna’s experience in a mental hospital, Lisa’s Personality definitely dominated the movie. Lisa was surly a girl who was interrupted. She had a personality so bold, vibrant, deceitful, corrupt, and intrusive all at once. Over the years, her personality was known by many names. Labels consisting of Mania without delirium, moral insanity, egopathy, sociopath, and psychopathy (Barlow & Durrand, 2015)