Girl, Interrupted: Chapter 19 Summary & Analysis

Insanity, Kaysen writes, comes in “two basic varieties: slow and fast.” She argues that the names for various types of insanity (depression, catatonia, mania, anxiety) do not actually say much about how these varying insanities feel. The slow form of insanity feels “viscous:” experiences are thick, perceptions are dull, and time drips slowly through this “clogged filter.” Velocity, in contrast, speeds up the body and creates “too much perception,” as well as an accompanying “plethora” of thoughts about the complexities of thoughts themselves.

Though viscosity and velocity are opposites, Kaysen writes, they often look the same. While viscosity causes “the stillness of disinclination,” velocity inspires a “stillness of fascination.” Repetitive thought is common to both speeds, and an “avalanche of pre-thought thoughts” can come out of nowhere whether one is mired in velocity or viscosity. These repetitive thoughts, Susanna writes, have no meaning, and are simply “idiot mantras” which trigger one another in a domino effect until one is effectively buried beneath them, trapped in a “blunted” haze of circuitous thoughts which eventually take on the quality of elevator Muzak.

Kaysen wonders whether it is worse to overload or underload, and notes that the two poles of insanity would assert themselves at varying moments, rushing or sometimes dribbling through her before quickly passing on. Susanna wonders where these thoughts came from and where they went when they left her, and considers this the “great mystery of mental illness.”