How to Go Mad Without Losing Your Mind
Madness and Black Radical Creativity
Duke University Press · Print & ebook · June 18, 2021
“Hold tight.
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- Who it’s for
- For readers interested in madness in Black radical art
- Themes
- Madness and Black radical creativity, Madness as artistic strategy, Black radical tradition
- Pacing
- Reflective
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Start with this bookAbout this book
“Hold tight. The way to go mad without losing your mind is sometimes unruly.” So begins La Marr Jurelle Bruce's urgent provocation and poignant meditation on madness in black radical art. Bruce theorizes four overlapping meanings of madness: the lived experience of an unruly mind, the psychiatric category of serious mental illness, the emotional state also known as “rage,” and any drastic deviation from psychosocial norms.
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With care and verve, he explores the mad in the literature of Amiri Baraka, Gayl Jones, and Ntozake Shange; in the jazz repertoires of Buddy Bolden, Sun Ra, and Charles Mingus; in the comedic performances of Richard Pryor and Dave Chappelle; in the protest music of Nina Simone, Lauryn Hill, and Kendrick Lamar, and beyond. These artists activate madness as content, form, aesthetic, strategy, philosophy, and energy in an enduring black radical tradition. Joining this tradition, Bruce mobilizes a set of interpretive practices, affective dispositions, political principles, and existential orientations that he calls “mad methodology.” Ultimately, How to Go Mad without Losing Your Mind is both a study and an act of critical, ethical, radical madness.
Who it’s for
- For readers interested in madness in Black radical art
- For readers interested in art, music, comedy, and protest as radical expression
Where it sits
| Black American Art | 34% |
|---|---|
| Black Lit Crit | 34% |
| Mental Health | 29% |
Percentages are BookFrontier’s reading of the book.
Publisher categories
- Black Lit Crit
- Jazz
- African American Studies
- Authors
- La Marr Jurelle Bruce
- Publisher
- Duke University Press
- Published
- June 18, 2021
- Format
- Print & ebook
- Theme
- Madness and Black radical creativity · Madness as artistic strategy · Black radical tradition
- Reading lane
- Black Lit Crit