Under the Influence

Last week we covered imagination and the influence of alcohol, drugs and mental illness (my lecturer referred to the latter as madness which annoyed me). I have always been interested in the relationship between mental health and writers. A useful handout showed us the number of writers, artists and musicians who had suffered from depression and bi-polar but to be honest, as mental health affects one in four if us, it would probably be the case that one could identify a number of 'famous' people in any category of employment that had had mental illness at some point in their life.
I have started researching my coursework (a critical essay, creative piece and critical commentary - 6,000 words) and am getting happily lost in it. It isn't due until January but I do not want to be doing it at the last minute.