Blue Met's Mental Health and Literature

We are very excited about launching two aspects of this important part of literature. Since mental health and literature have long reflected various aspects of one another, we decided to focus a series of events at the 2013 Festival which will explore key aspects of the connection between literature and mental illness. Some events include:

David Homel's The Speaking Cure

Researching Mental Health, a CBC event with Jeanette Kelley and with David Homel, Ken Konor, Thomas Pletzinger and Susan Pinker, a look at how writers do research when creating characters with mental illness and how clinicians extract diagnoses from narratives of those suffering from mental disorders.

On the Border of Good and Evil: this will be talk hosted by Dr. Camillo Zacchia of the Douglas Institute, about the point where society breaks down and stigma, prejudice and the fact that so often those with mental illness are segregated from the rest of society.

Autism and Bad Animals. This will be a discussion with author Joel Yanofsky (Bad Animals) and several experts on autism about the one father's experience and various treatments and hope for the future.

Joel Yanofsky's Bad Animals

50 Shades of Grey and Social Anxiety (in French): this round-table will be a discussion about what the phenomenon of the Fifty Shades book says about women and sexuality today. With noted Sex Therapist Karine Bilodeau-Côté.

And other events including Bibliotherapie and several writing workshops.

The entire schedule is released in late March.

Check out the online platform, too, of Mental Health and literature which contains writing workshops, resources and books that are recommended.