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What can we learn about madness from plays? Plays when they portray madness put it into the context of the events and circumstances that have afflicted the person, and provide models of madness which interest all those who meet madness in their professional work or their daily lives. Derek Russell Davis believes that playgoers can learn as much about madness at the theatre as from textbooks of psychiatry, and that the understanding plays give of madness is all the more vivid because the events are presented dramatically, evoking feelings as well as intellectual curiosity. In Scenes of Madness, Davis discusses the account given by playwrights of the madness afflicting such diverse characters as Orestes, Oedipus, Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Dr Faustus, Peer Gynt, Oswald Alving, Ivanov and Blanche Dubois. The madness depicted in plays is put into the context of the crucial experiences in the person's history and current relationships, and is shown to arise out of the crises in systems of relationships and to recover when there is reconciliation. Davis argues that those working in the field of mental health can learn much from the playwrights about the psychological processes in the development of mental illness and its recovery, as well as about the effects of intervention. Scenes of Madness demonstrates clearly the lessons to be learnt at the theatre, showing how plays can be a valuable new source of insight for professionals working with mental illness in a hospital or clinic setting.
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