Histrionic Personality Disorder, Applied to Myrtle Wylson and Curley's Wife
Sruthi Boddapati
English II Honors
Mrs. O’Neill
13 June 2014
When Love Becomes Sin
“Love is blind, and lovers cannot see what petty follies they themselves commit” (Shakespeare). Even Shakespeare, having mastered the art of romance with classically timeless literature, claims that love is blind in that those that are in its grasp cannot see fault within each other. A simple concept, it can have two very distinct meanings, because love is also blinding and makes those previously mentioned, blinded souls, go to astounding lengths for one another. But, how far are they willing to go? Could it be infatuation? When does love, in fact, become sinful? All are questions that plague the minds of two very fragile women, characters of novels that are timeless depictions of romance themselves in their bitter-sweet ways. Myrtle Wilson of the novel, The Great Gatsby, and Curley’s Wife of the novel, Of Mice and Men, both exhibit symptoms and behaviors during the course of the stories, which classify them as having Histrionic personality disorder.
To elaborate, the premise of diagnosing these characters as having Histrionic personality disorder requires a description of the ailment itself. It is a disease of the mind, in which the patients are emotionally volatile and overly dramatic in ways that draw attention to themselves (Blais, Ch. 39). The cause is still a mystery, and many experts in the field believe that the answer lies in genes and childhood events. And with no correlation to any of its symptoms or origin, the disorder is more frequently recognized and diagnosed in women, usually manifesting itself in the host by late teens to early twenties. Similar to all other personality disorders, this ailment can also be flatly undetectable to most and bordering all the characteristics of someone who is simply self-indulgent to an extreme extent. As stated in the A.D.A.M. Medical Encyclopedia, “People with this disorder are usually able to function at a high level and can be
English II Honors
Mrs. O’Neill
13 June 2014
When Love Becomes Sin
“Love is blind, and lovers cannot see what petty follies they themselves commit” (Shakespeare). Even Shakespeare, having mastered the art of romance with classically timeless literature, claims that love is blind in that those that are in its grasp cannot see fault within each other. A simple concept, it can have two very distinct meanings, because love is also blinding and makes those previously mentioned, blinded souls, go to astounding lengths for one another. But, how far are they willing to go? Could it be infatuation? When does love, in fact, become sinful? All are questions that plague the minds of two very fragile women, characters of novels that are timeless depictions of romance themselves in their bitter-sweet ways. Myrtle Wilson of the novel, The Great Gatsby, and Curley’s Wife of the novel, Of Mice and Men, both exhibit symptoms and behaviors during the course of the stories, which classify them as having Histrionic personality disorder.
To elaborate, the premise of diagnosing these characters as having Histrionic personality disorder requires a description of the ailment itself. It is a disease of the mind, in which the patients are emotionally volatile and overly dramatic in ways that draw attention to themselves (Blais, Ch. 39). The cause is still a mystery, and many experts in the field believe that the answer lies in genes and childhood events. And with no correlation to any of its symptoms or origin, the disorder is more frequently recognized and diagnosed in women, usually manifesting itself in the host by late teens to early twenties. Similar to all other personality disorders, this ailment can also be flatly undetectable to most and bordering all the characteristics of someone who is simply self-indulgent to an extreme extent. As stated in the A.D.A.M. Medical Encyclopedia, “People with this disorder are usually able to function at a high level and can be
Cited: Steinbeck, J. (1994). Of mice and men. New York, N.Y., U.S.A: Penguin Books. Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. 1st ed. New York: Scribner, 2004. Print. Blais MA, Smallwood P, Groves JE, Rivas-Vazquez RA. Personality and personality disorders. In: Stern TA, Rosenbaum JF, Fava M, Biederman J, Rauch SL, eds. Massachusetts General Hospital Comprehensive Clinical Psychiatry. 1st ed. Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier Mosby; (2008):ch. 39. Kusuma, A. Analysis of “Materialistic Perception” in F. Scott Fitzgerald Using Marxist Literary Criticism, Analysis