創造性的黑暗面 抑鬱焦慮瘋狂等於天才

原文地址：http://edition.cnn.com/2014/01/22/world/the-dark-side-of-creativity-vincent-van-gogh/index.html?hpt=hp_c4

原創翻譯：龍騰網 http://www.ltaaa.com 翻譯：小陳

正文翻譯：

(CNN) -- Celebrated Norwegian artist Edvard Munch's life was fraught with anxiety and hallucinations.

（CNN）——挪威著名藝術家愛德華蒙克的一生充滿焦慮和幻覺。

The painter, who died 70 years ago today, created one of the most recognized masterpieces in history, "The Scream", which came to him in a sinister vision as he stood on the edges of Oslofjord.

這名畫家在70年前的今天去世，創作出了史上最傑出的作品之一《吶喊》，靈感來源：當他站在奧斯陸峽灣時，這種陰險的幻想向他襲來。

"The sun began to set - suddenly the sky turned blood red," he wrote. "I stood there trembling with anxiety - and I sensed an endless scream passing through nature."

"太陽開始落山——突然間天空變成了血紅色，"他寫道。"我站在那裡焦慮的顫抖著——我能感覺到一種無限的吶喊在穿越著整個大自然。"

The painting is thought to represent the angst of modern man, which Munch experienced deeply throughout his life, but saw as an indispensable driver of his art. He wrote in his diary: "My fear of life is necessary to me, as is my illness. They are indistinguishable from me, and their destruction would destroy my art."

這幅畫作代表著當代人類的焦慮，蒙克的一生對這種焦慮深有體會，但也是他的藝術的不可或缺的驅動力。他在日記中寫道："生活的恐懼對我來說是不可缺少的，正如疾病對我來說不可或缺一樣。它們和我連成了一體，毀滅了它們就等於毀滅了我的藝術。"

Munch may be one of the most high profile artists to walk the line between extreme talent and torment, but he is not the only one.

或許蒙克是介於極端天賦和痛苦之間的最高調藝術家之一，但他並不是唯一。

Vincent van Gogh, who cut of his ear after an argument with his friend Paul Gauguin, and later killed himself, swayed heavily between genius and madness.

梵谷和好友保羅高更爭論後切掉了自己的耳朵，後來還自殺，他也是天才和瘋子的結合體。

In a letter to his brother Theo in 1888 he wrote: "I am unable to describe exactly what is the matter with me. Now and then there are horrible fits of anxiety, apparently without cause, or otherwise a feeling of emptiness and fatigue in the head... at times I have attacks of melancholy and of atrocious remorse.

在1888年寫給兄弟的一份信件中，他寫道："我無法準確形容自己到底是怎麼了。時不時就會感到莫名的焦慮，要不然就是頭腦中感到空虛和疲勞。。。時不時就會被憂鬱和哀愁纏身。"

These painters' personal struggles still echo in popular culture today, and have given rise to the belief that artists are more susceptible to a range of mental illnesses, including bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

這些畫家的個人掙扎在如今的大眾文化中依舊存在反響，人們相信藝術家更容易受到一系列精神疾病的影響，包括躁鬱症和精神分裂症。

A growing body of research suggests that there is merit to that popular assumption. Madness may lurk where creativity lies.

大量的研究表明大眾們如此的假設是有一定道理的。瘋狂或許就潛伏在創造性之下。

The dark side of creativity

創造性的黑暗面

Psychologists have been fascinated by the potential link for decades. The earliest and most rudimentary studies examined eminent people across fields including literature and the arts.

幾十年來，心理學家都沉醉於這樣的設想中。在一些最初和最基本的研究中，對各個領域傑出人物進行了調查，包括文學和藝術。

These studies found that creatives had an unusually high number of mood disorders. Charles Dickens, Tennessee Williams, and Eugene O'Neill all appeared to suffer from clinical depression. So too did Ernest Hemingway, Leo Tolstoy and Virginia Woolf. Sylvia Plath famously took her own life by sticking her head in an oven while her two children slept.

這些研究發現，創造性的人更經常出現情緒異常。查爾斯狄更斯，田納西威廉斯，尤金奧尼爾，這些好像都患有臨床抑鬱症。還有海明威，託爾斯泰，維吉尼亞伍爾夫。而西爾維婭普拉斯更絕，在自己兩個孩子睡覺時，她把頭放進烤箱自殺身亡。

Critics rightly pointed out that these studies focused on very specific groups of high-achievers, and that they relied on anecdotal evidence.

批評家認為這些初步基礎研究只關注特定的高成就者，而且依賴的都是經驗之談的證據。

Subsequent studies have cast the net wider. Simon Kyaga led a team of researchers at Sweden's Karolinska Institute.

接下來的研究撒了更大的網。瑞典卡洛琳斯卡學院的研究人員做了研究，由Simon Kyaga帶頭。

Using a registry of psychiatric patients, they tracked nearly 1.2 million Swedes and their relatives. The patients demonstrated conditions ranging from schizophrenia and depression to ADHD and anxiety syndromes.

根據登記的精神病患者數據，研究人員追蹤了120萬瑞典人和他們的親屬。這些患者的病症包括精神分裂症、抑鬱症、注意力不集中症以及焦慮症候群。

They found that people working in creative fields, including dancers, photographers and authors, were 8% more likely to live with bipolar disorder. Writers were a staggering 121% more likely to suffer from the condition, and nearly 50% more likely to commit suicide than the general population.

他們發現在創意領域工作的人中（比如舞者，攝影師，作家），患躁鬱症的可能性比一般人高出8%。作家比一般人高出121%，而自殺可能性比一般人高出將近一半。

var cpro_id = "u1180999"; They also found that people in creative professions were more likely to have relatives with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, anorexia and autism.

他們還發現，從事創意職業的人更可能擁有患精神分裂症、躁鬱症、厭食以及孤獨症的親屬。

That is significant. Earlier studies on families have suggested that there could be an inherited trait that gives rise to both creativity and mental illness.

這個研究發現具有重大意義。對家庭成員的早期研究表明創造性和精神疾病都是可遺傳的。

Some people may inherit a form of the trait that fosters creativity without the burden of mental illness, while others may inherit an amped-up version that stokes anxiety, depression and hallucinations.

有些人遺傳了家族創造性的特徵，卻不用受精神疾病的折磨，而有些人卻沒那麼幸運，得到了加強版的遺傳版本，還要遭受焦慮、抑鬱以及幻覺的折磨之苦。

There is anecdotal evidence supporting the connection. Albert Einstein's son lived with schizophrenia, as did James Joyce's daughter.

現實中存在著支持這種關聯的軼事版本。愛因斯坦的兒子就患有精神分裂症，詹姆斯喬伊斯的女兒也是如此。

Keri Szaboles, a psychiatrist at Semmelweis University in Hungary, has studied the role genes may play more directly.

匈牙利賽麥爾維斯大學的精神病學家Keri Szaboles研究了基因所可能扮演的更直接作用。

Szaboles gave 128 participants a creativity test followed by a blood test. He found that those who demonstrated the greatest creativity carried a gene associated with severe mental disorders.

驗血後，Keri Szaboles對128名參與者進行了創造性測試。他發現那些最富有創意的人也同時攜帶有一個與嚴重精神障礙相關的基因。

Method in the madness?

瘋狂中的方法？

Psychologists have established a link between mental illness and creativity, but they are still piecing together the mechanisms that underlie it.

心理學家已經建立了精神疾病和創造性之間的相關性，但是他們還在探索這種相關性的運作機制。

In September neuroscientist Andreas Fink and his colleagues at the University of Graz in Austria published a study comparing the brains of creative people and people living with schizotypy.

9月，神經系統科學家Andreas Fink和奧地利格拉茨大學的同事們發表了一份研究報告，對創造性人才的大腦同分裂性人格障礙患者的大腦進行了對比。

Schizotypy is a less severe manifestation of schizophrenia. People with the condition may demonstrate odd beliefs (like a belief in aliens) or behavior (like wearing inappropriate clothes). Unlike schizophrenics, they do not have delusions and are not disconnected from reality.

分裂性人格障礙是精神分裂症的較輕微表現。患這種障礙的人會有奇怪的信念（比如認為有外星人存在）或者奇怪的行為（比如不適當的著裝）。不像精神分裂症患者，他們沒有沒有幻想，也不會與現實脫節。

Fink and his team recruited participants demonstrating low and high levels of schizotypy. They then slid them into a functional magnetic resonance imaging machine, and asked them to come up with novel ways of using every day objects. They later assessed the originality of their responses.

Fink和他的團隊邀請了輕微和嚴重分裂性人格障礙患者。然後對他們進行機能性磁共振成像掃描，並且要求他們說出如何以奇特的方式來使用日常物品。隨後對他們回答的創意性進行分析。

An interesting pattern emerged. Among those high in schizotypy and those who scored highest on originality, the right precuneus - a region of the brain involved in attention and focus - kept firing during idea generation. Normally this region deactivates during a complex task, which is thought to help a person focus.

分析的結果非常有趣。那些嚴重分裂性人格障礙患者和回答創意性最高的患者中，右楔前葉——該大腦區域涉及人的注意力和關注——在構思過程中都非常活躍。而一般情況下，在複雜的任務中該區域不會活躍，這樣才能才有助於一個人集中注意力。

Put more simply, the results suggest that creatives and those with high levels of schizotypy take in more information and are less able to ignore extraneous details. Their brain does not allow them to filter.

也就是說，嚴重分裂性人格障礙患者和回答創意性最高的患者吸收了更多信息，也更加不會去忽視外來的細節。他們的大腦不允許他們進行信息的過濾。

Scott Barry Kaufman, an American psychologist and writer for Scientific American, has summed up the results this way. "It seems that the key to creative cognition is opening up the flood gates and letting in as much information as possible," he writes. "Because you never know: sometimes the most bizarre associations can turn into the most productively creative ideas."

Scott Barry Kaufman是美國心理學家，同時也是《科學美國人》的撰稿人，他以下面這種方式總結了研究結果："如此看來，要想具備創造性，那就得大開閘門，讓儘可能多的信息進入大腦。因為有些事情你無法預測：有時候看起來非常奇怪的關聯都會變成最具成果的創意想法。"

Clearly some people suffer for their art, and clearly some art stems from suffering. But it would be inaccurate to say that all creatives run the risk of mental illness.

顯然，有些人為自己的藝術而遭受痛苦，而有些藝術就是源自痛苦。但是不能說所有的創造性人才都有患上精神疾病的風險。

Kyaga, the Swedish academic, points out that dancers, directors, and visual artists demonstrated mental illnesses less frequently than the general population.

瑞典學者Kyaga指出舞者、導演、視覺藝術家比一般人群更不經常患有精神疾病。

評論翻譯:

All this time I thought I had depression and other problems, but in fact I am a genius? that's awesome

一直以來，我都以為自己患有抑鬱症和其他問題，但實際上我是個天才？這太棒了。

When you are happy, you enjoy the music.

When you are sad, you understand the lyrics.

- Frank Ocean.

當你快樂時，你享受音樂。

當你悲傷時，你就明白了歌詞的含義。

— 佛蘭克 歐辛

Clearly, not everyone that is mentally ill is a creative genius and vice versa. But there is an obvious connection. I've struggled with depression for most of my life, even as a kid. I've always been told I'm weird, or the things I think about, the connections I make are so random or weird. I am creative, I draw and I'm a photographer. It's hard to get out of the funk because your mind feels like you're in a labyrinth that never ends. The thoughts and dreams and things never stop and there's this constant hunger for information. It gets to the point where I can't talk to most people about what I'm interested in because they have no idea what I'm talking about and I just see myself sometimes overwhelming people with information. Or people take it like I'm being a know it all snob when they mention something and I've heard of it, or know about it. And that makes it even harder, people misunderstand you. I've just gotten to the point where when I'm around simple people, I tone it down and keep my thoughts to myself. I guess the most basic way to put it is, it's really hard to find anyone that I can bounce ideas and knowledge off of where they can keep up. I have a few friends like that, but I need more. Sometimes I don't know if I was born depressed or if the feeling of never, ever fitting in and constantly being misunderstood has made me this way.

顯然，精神病患者和天才並不存在必然的聯繫。但也是存在一定關係的。我大半輩子都在與抑鬱症做鬥爭，很小的時候就開始了。人們總是對我說我是個奇怪的人，或者我的想法有多麼的怪異。我非常具有創意性，我會畫畫，而且還是一名攝影師。我無法逃脫恐懼感，就好像自己身處永無盡頭的迷宮一樣。那些想法和幻想等等之類永不停歇，而且對信息總是非常的饑渴。這種情況糟糕到我無法和大多數人談論我感興趣的事情，因為人們根本不知道我在談些什麼，我所提供的大量信息讓他們喘不過氣來。或者人們會認為我是無所不知的勢利小人，因為他們所提到的事情，我也已經聽說過，或者對之已有所了解。所以人們誤解你，溝通變得更加不可能。所以現在當我和普通人在一起時，我會變得非常低調，不把自己的想法說出來。所以現在要找到有能力和我搭上話的人還真是不容易。雖然我有一些朋友可以做到這一點，但是我需要更多這樣的朋友。有時候，我都不知道自己是天生抑鬱呢，還是說這種不適應和被誤解的感覺讓我變成了這個樣子。

Me and you would get on well. I hunger for new information too, and get so bored with people who don't share that same hunger. Most people I know who are creative are also prone to mood disorders and self doubt. It's a paradox, but the brightest people I know are also the ones who doubt their intelligence and ability, whilst the overly confident ones are blunted.

我和你可能合得來，我也是每時每刻都在尋找信息，我會對那些對信息沒有饑渴的人抱有厭倦感。我所認認識的大多數創造性人才都有情緒失常的傾向。這是悖論，我所知道的那些最聰明的人也都對自己的智商和能力持有懷疑的態度，而那些過度自信的人都比較呆笨。

I liked the idea from the article that creativity may be a result of a filtering issuing to a particular area of the brain that is not functioning typically to shut down to allow for focus on tasks, If your brain is dealing with all the information around you your mind wanders and it is difficult to focus on tasks or patterns of social conversation. While on the other hand it offers connections for ideas and thoughts out of the ordinary which leads to creative insight and perspective out of the norm - the so called crazy part. Not diagnosing, but. It sounds like possibly Add or Adhd which can be managed nutritionally and medically. I know a couple friends with Add. One finds that the creativity of connection making adds to his life and is not depressed and is very successful in business and can manage socially without treatment - creativity is, also, not limited to artists. Since you have depression with your creativity you may consider looking into treatment for that part of it or both. Otherwise if your depression is manageable you may just regard your ' free association ' creative mind as a gift of sorts. One friend diagnosed with Add said to me Add is not a mental disorder, but, a personality type. Your correct though it can be very unsettling to many people socially and there are few people that are comfortable with what they consider ' off the wall ' thinking in narrow social conditioned mindsets - the simple you refer to. Being different isn't always a negative thing and being self aware as you evidently are is a sign of your maturity as you become comfortable with who you are. Good luck to you !

我喜歡文章中的一個觀點，那就是創造性是大腦某個部分的過濾功能失常導致的。如果你的大腦正在處理周遭的各種信息，那你的大腦就會很迷茫，很難集中注意力，無法與人交流。而另一方面來說，這種腦袋可以促使你在平凡中看到想法和主意，最終讓你變成一個創造性的人才——也就是所謂瘋狂的部分。我不是在做診斷，但是這聽起來有點像注意力不集中症或者注意缺陷多動障礙，可以從營養和醫學上進行治療。我認識一些患有這種症狀的朋友。其中一人認為這種創造性讓他的生活更加豐富了，也不會抑鬱，他自己做生意，做得很好，社交也沒問題，不用接受治療。而且創造性並非藝術家獨有。如果你的創造性對你自己的生活造成了負面的抑鬱影響，那麼你應該去接受治療。而如果你的這種抑鬱情緒是可控的，那麼你可能把這種"自由聯想"的創造性腦袋當做是上天的恩賜。一名被診斷出患有注意不集中症的朋友對我說，這種症狀並非精神障礙，而是一種人格類型。這種人在社交場合確實會給許多人帶來困擾，沒有多少人會對這種"瘋狂的"社交行為感到舒服。但是與常人不同並非總是消極的，自我意識是成熟的標誌，因為那意味著你接納了自己。