From: Britannica.com [mailto:movable.type@newsletters.britannica.com] Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2000 4:35 AM To: jchen@xxxxxxxxxx Subject: Movable Type | July 11, 2000 Movable Type | Britannica.com | July 11, 2000 TODAY IN ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT | A Lethal Stroke of Genius --------------------- Britannica.com presents the "dark side of creative passion" with an essay and image gallery depicting the final days of artists on the brink of genius and madness. http://tm0.com/sbct.cgi?s=32179179&i=221049&d=309505 --------------------- "There was never a genius without a tincture of madness." --Aristotle quoted in Seneca, "De Tranquilitate Anima" ["The Great Thoughts," George Seldes, ed.] --------------------- "Madness, provided it comes as a gift from heaven, is the channel by which we receive the greatest blessings.... If a man comes to the door of poetry untouched by the madness of the Muses, believing that technique alone will make him a great poet, he and his sane compositions never reach perfection, but are utterly eclipsed by the performances of the inspired madman." --Plato in "Phaedrus," quoted by Jeffrey Meyers in "The Greek Idea of Disease, Madness, and Art" ["The Greek Idea of Disease, Madness, and Art," World and I, January 1999] --------------------- "In a real dark night of the soul it is always three o'clock in the morning, day after day." --F. Scott Fitzgerald in "Esquire" ["The Merriam-Webster Dictionary of Quotations"] --------------------- "A book is a postponed suicide." --E.M. Cioran, quoted by Will Blythe in the introduction to "Why I Write: Thoughts on the Craft of Fiction" ["Why I Write: Thoughts on the Craft of Fiction," Will Blythe, ed.] --------------------- "Great wits are sure to madness near allied And thin partitions do their bounds divide." --"Absalom and Achitophel" by John Dryden ["Familiar Quotations," John Bartlett, ed., Bartleby.com] --------------------- "Promises, promises." --Dorothy Parker, when told by her doctor "that she would be dead in a month if she did not stop drinking." ["The Portable Curmudgeon: Dorothy Parker Anecdotes," Jon Winokur, ed.] --------------------- Movable Type | Britannica.com | Edited by Jo Rosenbohm Send comments to newsletters@us.britannica.com. --------------------- Explore Britannica.com at http://www.britannica.com. --------------------- Visit the Britannica Store at http://www.britannica.com/store. --------------------- You are subscribed to Movable Type under this e-mail address: jchen@xxxxxxxxxx. --------------------- To subscribe, visit http://www.britannica.com/newsletters. To unsubscribe, reply to this note with the word "unsubscribe" in the subject line or send a blank e-mail message to this address: movable.type-off@newsletters.britannica.com.