vintage
From Freud to phrenology to old-school outlooks, a look back at vintage psychiatry and mental health treatments as documented throughout history.
the end of VOLUME 1 of ENFJ Gogol's novel DEAD SOULS
Chichikov did nothing but smile, slightly rising and falling on his leather cushion, because he delighted in rapid motion. And indeed, which Russian isn't fond of speedy travel? How could such a soul, longing to spin wildly, to lose itself in revelry, to sometimes cry out, 'To hell with everything!' --how could his soul not love it? How could one not love it, when it carries a hint of something blissfully magical? It seems as if some enigmatic force has lifted you aloft, borne upon its wing, and you yourself are flying, and everything is flying: the miles sweep past, merchants atop their kibitkas [wagons] hasten to meet you, the forest streams by on either hand with somber files of spruce and pine, resounding with the axe's stroke and the raven's cry; the entire road rushes off to some unknowable vanishing distance, and something terrifying is concealed in this rapid flickering, where the disappearing object does not have time to be discerned -- only the sky above your head, the light clouds, and the struggling moon alone seem motionless. Eh, troika! bird-troika, who was it that conceived you? surely you could only have been born among a spirited people, in that land that cares not for jesting, but has spread out smooth and level over half the earth, and you may go on counting the miles till they dance before your eyes. And it’s no clever device, it seems — no iron bolts hold it together — but with just an axe and a hammer, in haste yet with masterful strokes, a resourceful Yaroslavl peasant crafted you, alive and pulsing. No polished German boots for this coachman: just a wild beard and thick mittens, seated on the Devil knows what, then, with a swift rise, a sweeping motion, and a song bursting forth, the horses surge like a storm, the wheel spokes spinning into a perfect, smooth blur, the road quivers, a frightened passerby cries out -- and away they go, thundering, racing, vanishing into the distance!.. And there, far off, something looms into view, trailing dust and piercing the air.
By ANTICHRIST SUPERSTAR10 months ago in Psyche
Glass and Sand
I write in abstract, from a place within myself, a transitory philosophical non-representational 'speak', not of real life happenings, which is expected of me, but of a more evolved view of life wrapped in a metamorphosis of my thoughts. I have no life shattering tale to tell...or maybe I am averse to the telling...of that I am unsure.
By Antoni De'Leon10 months ago in Psyche
Chapter IV: The Fool’s Lament Beneath the Comet’s Eye
Kraków was engulfed in night like a heavy coat that thickened and resisted shedding, as if there were an invisible force rejecting all life around. Inside a chamber dark as the depths of a comet’s tail spilling through a window, glowing a faint grey, sat a man alone. His clothes were a strange mixture of bright red and black, adorned with jingle bells that rang out laughter, as though whatever once caused them to do so was simply an echo now devoid of sound. This man was Stańczyk, the court jester, yet the expression on his face was anything but jovial. He appeared astonishingly forlorn, his haunted gaze lost deep within the throes of a letter weightily spread open on the table before him. All Stańczyk could notice was a broken, worn wax seal that appeared flaccid like human desire, and the letter whispered softly with the simple phrase 'Smolensk is lost.'
By LUCCIAN LAYTH10 months ago in Psyche
Soviet/Russian INFJ Maxim Gorky's The Life of Klim Samgin (VOLUME TWO)
In Spivak's recounting of the exhibition and the fair, Klim Samgin became aware that the tenderness he had once felt survived solely in his memory, having vanished as an emotion. He knew that what he was saying wasn't interesting. He was embarrassed by his desire to establish his own line between the exaggerated adoration of some newspapers and the grumbling cynicism of others, and besides, he feared falling into the rude and mocking tone of Inokov's satirical pieces.
By ANTICHRIST SUPERSTAR10 months ago in Psyche
Chapter III: The Painter’s Paradox — Creation as Annihilation
There is a man whose artwork is not composed with a brush dipped in paint, but rather dipped in existence itself. The bristles of his paint brush, dipped in a white so bright it worships the very idea of painting, are believed to be the extract of the very marrow of the soul itself. Each stroke is not just light on canvas, but light imagined; he contains the power to release light into the fathomless void lurking around the periphery of life. He is a painter of the endless dark, a witness to a subjectless mute whose silence speaks louder than any tangible utterance. Language fails here; any word on the edge of the subject's tongue is siphoned away, absorbed, dissolved, and regurgitated onto the dried slick of basanit slate as pigment. What else could it be called but a sacrament? His brush as chalice; his white, the dictated libation of a soul grasping at meaning in its own frailty.But as the light escapes his brush, the shadow is also introduced.
By LUCCIAN LAYTH11 months ago in Psyche
Chapter XVII: The Sovereign of Shadows
The wind shrieked, calling me through the hollow arches of my empire, and shared the whispers of those from which I had long departed. They did not capitulate, they did not bend the knee—those stubborn flames in their unyielding commitment who were steadfast in grisly devotion to my cause even while I drifted into infinite nothingness. I stand now before the stripped down bones of my empire, their magnificence reduced to chambers of resonating echo and thrones of dust. *Why have I returned?* The question coils in my heart like the serpent of eternal regret. Perhaps it is the burden of promises I once scarred into the flesh of memory now bleeding through the cracks of time. Or perhaps it is the truth that solitude, even from this frayed kingdom, is a reprieve from the honeyed mumble of humankind. Humanity—how shameless a pantomime! They murmur constantly of virtues they loathe, and in the very next breath, dive into the sins of their own disdain. Their laugh, a knife—that roasts, and their kindness, a mask stuck to rotten flesh. I have tasted their "compassion," a goblet of vinegar, and spit it back into oblivion. They are the architects of their own suffering, bringing offerings of opinions about the innocence of gutting like lambs to a slaughterhouse. Weakness masquerades as strength in their world—a monstrous breeding from the bones of gentle chitterers.
By LUCCIAN LAYTH11 months ago in Psyche
Way back when we were grownups...Were we though?
Do humans ever really feel truly grown-up. Or is it a skewered, befuddling and abstract confusing subject. Adulthood...that glittering mirage on the horizon of youth, often feels like a destination that never quite materializes. Many chase the elusive notion of being "grown-up", only to discover that the essence of maturity is neither linear ( consisting of or related to straight lines, or a single dimension) nor definitive. It’s a bit like trying to grasp a shadow—it morphs, evades, and teases, leaving you wondering if it was ever meant to be caught or held unto earnestly or desperately.
By Antoni De'Leon11 months ago in Psyche
Change is a Part of Life
In the Sonapur village, the old mango tree was casting a shadow as the sun set. The slender dirt road where Rohan used to play was bathed in golden light. Now, years later, he was returning after a long time, a stranger to the place he once called home.
By Niranjon Chandra Roy11 months ago in Psyche
