£14.00
100 in stock
The Selected Works of a Manic Depressive
By Jason Pegler
ISBN: 978-1-904697-85-5
Published: 2005
Pages: 252
Key Themes: bi-polar disorder, manic depression, empowerment, recovery, film script
He is got guts, he is got heart and he is got vision. That is why people like him and his new book are essential for the mental health movement. – Dolly Sen, author, poet and mental health activist.
Description
Curing Madness is an inspirational selection of works by manic depressive and mental health activist Jason Pegler which details the thought processes he used to help himself survive. It includes a couple of excellent scripts about his experiences of manic depression, rap lyrics, an essay that examines madness in Greek Mythology and a personal account of what happened to him after he published his seminal book A Can of Madness.
Jason has become one of the UKs foremost experts on mental health. He now dedicates his life to helping others afflicted by mental illness. This is all a far cry from the young man who spent most of his formative years in and out of hospitals and teetering on the edge of addiction. Curing Madness is in essence a collection of works from different genres. he was so exhausted after writing A Can of Madness that something had to come next and this was Curing Madness. This is an important book for anybody who experiences some sort of mental distress. if you can get all your writing material together and turn it into your own selected works then this can help your confidence and allow future books to be written more easily.
Only logged in customers who have purchased this product may leave a review.
Judith Haire (verified owner) –
I can’t recommend this highly enough. Sorry for the cliche but it’s a real page turner. Sensitively written and inspirational it gives hope to everyone and is a hugely important and ground breaking book.
Dolly Sen (verified owner) –
Curing Madness is a selection of works by Jason Pegler and the thought processes he used to cure himself of manic depression. It includes a couple of excellent scripts about his experiences of manic depression, rap lyrics, a personal account of what happened to him after he published his seminal ‘A Can of Madness’ through Chipmunka Publishing, the social enterprise he set up. His previous book ‘A Can of Madness’ is a strong, unsettling book that shook the mental health world, and sold tens of thousands of copies. He writes about the impact of book publication, and not all of it was positive. Someone reported to the DSS that he had written a book, but Jason used the opportunity to be more self-determined and lived only on what Chipmunka earned him. And his life and Chipmunka’s has gone from strength to strength. He has come off medication and now dedicates his life to making this world a better place to live in for all.
There is a wonderful section in the book that examines madness in Greek Mythology. What is interesting is that perception of madness has not changed much for hundreds of centuries. In ancient Greece madness was a punishment from the gods for any act of hubris. But instead in modern times if you have a psychiatric diagnosis your hubris is punished with forced injections, ECT, strip searches, and a stigma that turns your skin into broken glass so no one wants to touch you. You are too dangerous to hug. With anger for this injustice, he responds with one of my favourite parts of the book, where he tells a lot of people to go fuck themselves – it is really beautiful to read!
Jason took the difficult step of coming off his medication. He suggests that madness needn’t be breakdown but breakthrough. When you are said to have an illness, that’s it, you are broken and cannot be fixed. Personally, I am sure with the right support and focus on developing personal power, the experience of madness can give you an amazing opportunity to change you and what is hurting your psyche for the better and the enhancement of those suffering in the world. The mental distress would not last as long as it does in the experience of the modern psychiatric patient. Pharmaceutical companies have a vested interest that you stay ill. Look at how much pharmaceutical companies would lose if you were given techniques and support to bring you out of your distress. This book details the techniques that have helped him to do just this.
He’s got guts, he’s got heart, he’s got vision. That’s why people like him – and his new book – are essential for the mental health movement. He invites us to be like Gandhi and Mandela, people call him delusional and arrogant for saying so. But the mad movement has to be a civil rights issue if anything is going to change for the better.
His book is inspirational , a rousing call, not to medication but to action. He asks us not to accept society’s or the medical profession’s concept of madness, but to accept you are you and are special and have immense personal power to change your and others lives. You may not agree with the way he does it but you can’t deny the passion of the man that wants to turn the pain of the mad into gold.
Tobias Smith (verified owner) –
Curing Madness is Jason Pegler’s second book. It is extremely enlightening as it shows how you can overcome adversity and be successful. It is a combination of Jason’s personal experiences, screenplays, rap lyrics and academic writing on the subject of madness. He frankly shares his experiences of how he cured himself from manic depression with you. You get a real insight into his life and how it is possible to get through the difficult situation of dealing with a mental health issue. It’s a worthy follow up to A Can of Madness.
Paul Brandwood (verified owner) –
Jason Pegler has written a work of huge importance to all of Society. He provides a unique insight into the sometimes calamitous world of those with mental health challenges and into the delightful and beneficial creativity of these minds. In doing so he provides those of us with a tenuous grasp on ‘sanity’ the much needed opportunity to develop understanding, compassion and a new way to look at the world and ourselves. Above all he postulates that the perception of mental illness exists as much in the minds of the observer as it does in those said to be suffering.
Jason Pleger (verified owner) –
In “Curing Madness” I share with the general public and other people who have suffered from mental health issues how I managed to cure myself. I wrote “Curing Madness” with the knowledge that i could reach out to more people by making myself an example of a fully recovered manic depressive. “Curing Madness” is the follow up to my autobiography “A Can of Madness”. By the end of “A Can of Madness” I had not fully recovered. The publishing of “Curing Madness” documents how i transformed myself. “Curing Madness” contains a mixture of prose, academic work, film scripts, philosophy and raps to recovery. The theme is one of self help and self belief. I aim to transform the term “mental illness” into mental well being so that there is no humiliation for people who experience mental distress.