Did Dickens have a "psychological breakdown" that helped cause his marriage to fall apart? Gaynor Arnold, author of a new novel based on the life of Dickens's wife, Catherine, suggests that he did. There seems to be a good deal of evidence backing her up. For one thing, there's the well-known quote from his daughter Kate about how her father was "like a madman" at the time; for another, there were the tremendous emotional highs and lows that he experienced for much of his life. Quite a few researchers have suspected that he suffered from manic depression.
The end of Dickens's marriage isn't something I enjoy writing about, or reading about. Even when you know your heroes have flaws, it's never pleasant to be reminded of them. However, there's this advantage: We know a lot more about mental illness now than we did then. Looking back at that time through the lens of the knowledge we now possess, we can have, as Arnold says, a little more understanding and sympathy for both spouses in that doomed marriage.
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