Fugue state

[David Morris]

I don't think D (the novels' character) called it fugue, because he
seemed to be in constant fear of its advent.

http://www.charge.org.uk/htmlsite/dost.shtml

The Russian Writer Dostoevsky, whose writings are among the worlds
greatest literature, had a rare form of temporal lobe epilepsy termed
"Ecstatic Epilepsy".    Dostoevsky kept records of 102 epileptic
seizures during his last two decades, which mainly occurred at night
and were tonic-clonic or grand-mal.  Seizures which occurred  in the
daytime were often preceded by an ecstatic aura, which has led
neurologists to theorise that he had temporal  lobe epilepsy  with
secondary grand-mal epilepsy.

[...]

Dostoevsky 's  observation of his own epilepsy:

" For several instants I experience a happiness that is impossible in
an ordinary state, and of which other people have no conception.  I
feel full harmony in myself and in the whole world, and the feeling is
so strong and sweet that for a few seconds of such bliss one could
give up ten years of life, perhaps all of life.

I felt that heaven descended to earth and swallowed me.  I really
attained god and was imbued with him.  All of you healthy people don't
even suspect  what happiness is , that happiness that we epileptics
experience for a second before an attack."





On Mon, Apr 6, 2009 at 2:34 PM, Richard Ryan <richardryannyc at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Does Dostoevesky call it a fugue state in the novel, David?  Coetzee's evocations of the "pre-seizure" moments were very striking and more than a little unsettling....