Against Depression - VENDIDO!

Peter D. Kramer
Viking, May 2005
416 pp.

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A decade ago, with his breakaway bestseller, Listening to Prozac, Peter Kramer revolutionized the way we think about antidepressants and the culture in which they are so widely used. Now he returns with a profound and original look at the condition those medications treat: depression. He asks: If we could eradicate depression so that no human being ever suffered it again, would we?

Against Depression is a groundbreaking assessment of the science of mood disorder—a field that has taken leaps forward in the past decade. Walking the reader through the full range of new research, Kramer shows how depression endangers nerve cells, disrupts brain functioning, damages the heart and the blood vessels, alters personal perspective and judgment, and interferes with parenting and family life. As the evidence mounts, there is no denying the obvious—that depression now qualifies fully as a disease, one of the most devastating known to humankind. And yet, says Kramer, we do not approach depression as a disease, not in our daily thinking.
Depression, linked in our culture to a long tradition of “heroic melancholy,” is often understood as ennobling—a source of creativity, integrity, insight, and even sensuality. Tracing these beliefs from Aristotle to the Romantics to Picasso, and to present-day memoirs of mood disorder, Kramer suggests that the pervasiveness of the illness has distorted our impression of what it is to be human. He shows how a head-on look at depression as we now know it will change our sense of self, our tastes in art and in love, and our account of what it is to live a good life.
Frank and unflinching, Against Depression is a deeply felt, deeply moving book, grounded in time spent with the depressed. As his argument unfolds, Kramer becomes a crusader, the author of a compassionate polemic that is fiercely against depression and the devastation it causes. Listening to Prozac stimulated a discussion that swept the nation and the world. Against Depression is equally original, and equally timely. Thought-provoking, challenging, enlightening, it will bring about a bold revision of our understanding of mood disorder and give hope to the millions who suffer from it.


Amazon.com
Written as an answer to the question, "What if van Gogh had been on anti-depressants," Against Depression manages to be more of an exploration than a polemic, regardless of its title. While author Peter Kramer (Listening to Prozac) expresses a definite opinion--that disease of any sort should be treated as effectively as possible--he manages to express sympathy along with frustration about the recurring idea that soulful creativity often goes hand-in-hand with depression. Without ever being dismissive or particularly angry, his writing makes his point abundantly clear after the first chapter: The pervasive idea of depression serving a creative purpose is preposterous, as well as highly damaging.
While he draws from a number of recent studies on depression, the book is not meant to assist in the diagnosis or treatment of individuals, except in a very general sense. Instead, Kramer adds the findings of those studies into his thoughts on how patients modify medication doses for depression as they wouldn’t for purely physical diseases, and looks into future possibilities of genetically modified stress hormone transmitters that could work to prevent a slide into chronic depression. In the arts, he examines the work of philosophers, painters and writers in relation to the reputation their personal lives have earned (critics and consumers alike believe that pain equals genius and lack of pain equals lack of depth). Adding Dineson, Bellow, Updike and Kierkegaard to the list headed by van Gogh, Kramer shows a variety of ways we live with the assumption that creative genius does not function without severe emotional strain.
While he does include a few stories from a patient to illustrate specific treatments, most of the book is slow and thoughtful, without ever being dry or pedantic. Useful to families or individuals who have encountered depression, this book offers excellent support for anyone--creative genius or otherwise--who struggle to define their talents as existing separately from their illness. Jill Lightner


Reviews:

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. What is depression really, and how does society define it? Kramer, a famed psychiatrist and author of the 1993 bestseller Listening to Prozac, says he has written "an insistent argument that depression is a disease, one we would do well to oppose wholeheartedly." In making his argument, Kramer examines the cultural roots of notions about depression and underscores the gap between what we know scientifically and what we feel about the illness. Kramer traces depression from Hippocrates through the Renaissance and Romantic "cult of melancholy" to advances in medicine, psychiatry and psychotherapy, and at last to the disease we now know it to be. Kramer’s curiosity drives the book forward as he ponders why we value artwork and literature built on despair: "certain of our aesthetic and intellectual preferences have been set by those who suffer... deeply." The book maintains the perfect balance between science and human interest, as the author details both psychiatric studies and personal experience. A comparison of the biochemical workings of depression with the physical and observable symptoms serves as an intellectual trip for readers and provides a thorough exploration of what Kramer dubs "the most devastating disease known to humankind." The book is rich with questions that engage the reader in an active dialogue: Why is society captive to depression’s charm? And will this infatuation change with the emergence of more evidence regarding depression’s severely disabling effects? Kramer leaves off with these questions to ponder. Resolute but not preachy, this book is an important addition to the growing public health campaign against depression. As for how we should define depression—perhaps it’s best understood by its opposite: "A resilient mind, sustained by a resilient brain and body." One Spirit and Discover Book Club selections. (May 9)
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From Booklist
Some dozen years after his surprise best-seller Listening to Prozac Kramer returns to the subject of depression, revealing that much more has been learned about it, enough to power a polemic--this book. Depression, Kramer suggests, is a disease whose reputation resembles those of tuberculosis, epilepsy, and other maladies once thought to distinguish as well as afflict their victims. In the first part of the book, he examines the attractiveness of depression that he has noticed affecting some of his patients, both depressives proper and men involved with depressive women, and that surfaces in modern literature, art, and thought that valorize the sad, alienated outsider and grim, dolorous moods. In the midst of that discussion, Kramer presents evidence of depression’s debilitating physical effects on the brain; this he uses to refute romanticization of the condition. The book’s second part presents more research and theory about depression, including studies concluding that depression is the most prevalent and by far the most costly medical condition in the U.S. Kramer is an excellent writer who makes the technical second part about as painless to absorb as anyone could. Still, many will breathe easier when, in the last part, he returns to the cultural construction of depression. He relates some autobiography attesting to his appreciation of alienation, but he asks that appreciation never be used to condone, trivialize, or prettify the depression that alienation often cloaks. We may be on the threshold of regarding depression as no more glamorous than the formerly aestheticized tuberculosis. Kramer urges us to feel that that time can’t come soon enough. Ray Olson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Quotes:

"Here one of our most thoughtful psychiatrists attends a wide-spread psychological malady - the bouts of melancholy that afflict so many individuals, laying them low in mind and spirit. This book offers much critical wisdom, even as it is written with a grace and sensitivity that will endear its words to the reader." - Robert Coles, Professor of Psychiatry and Medical Humanities, Harvard Medical School


In "Against Depression", Peter Kramer opens our eyes once again to a fresh, important and humane understanding of the human condition. His bold rethinking of the condition we call ’depression’ gives us a clear-eyed scenario for freedom from the grip of this soul-searing disorder." - Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence
"Our treasured sense of self is often challenged by neuroscience - how do you wedge ’Self’ in among neurons and synapses and neurotransmitters? No one has written about these issues in a more sensitive, thought-provoking and accessible way, and has touched more people in the process, than Peter Kramer." - Robert Sapolsky, Professor of Biological Sciences, Stanford University

"There is nothing romantic in the suffering of depression. Kramer shows us the horrific reality of the illness, dispelling myths that pervade popular culture. This book should usher in an era when the disordered chemistry of the brain is viewed with the same concern and care that mark the treatment of any malady." - Jerome Groopman, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School
“Peter Kramer is an analyst of exceptional sensitivity and insight.” – Joyce Carol Oates

About the Author

Peter D. Kramer, a clinical professor of psychiatry at Brown University, is the author of Should You Leave?, Moments of Engagement, Spectacular Happiness, and the international bestseller Listening to Prozac.