In the Jaws of the Black Dogs: A Memoir of Depression

by John Bentley Mays

In this courageous memoir, John Bentley Mays gives us a riveting account of what it is to live in the shadow of debilitating depression. Weaving intimate recollections with excerpts from the diaries he kept for thirty years, Mays illuminates the struggle that leads to breakdown and the uneasy truce achieved through psychotherapy. Along the way, he offers provocative commentary on the allure of cure, the cultural scripts of normality, and the distorting mirror of clinical language. A literary tour de force that began with an award winning essay, In the Jaws of the Black Dogs is not an objective analysis composed from the safety of hindsight. It is a writer's attempt to evoke the silent and distorting malignancy--as well as the moments of reprieve--of the only life he has ever known. Above all, he offers readers Although the black dogs cannot be entirely avoided, humor and the love and understanding of family and friends can keep the dogs at bay. From In The Jaws of the Black Dogs "This book is a life with the black dogs of depression. I have written it in a clearing bounded by thickets roamed by the killing dogs, sometimes wondering, in the writing, whether I would complete it before they returned on silent paws to snatch the text and me away. For the depressed can never be sure we can finish anything we begin, or indeed certain of anything, except the black dogs' eventual return, and their terrible circling of the clearing's edge. "There are a great many books about depression. This is not one of them. It is pain written, not observed; a depressive writer's writing, a testament transcribed from wounded flesh to paper in the clearing, before the black dogs' inevitable return."

Genres: Nonfiction, Psychology, Mental Health, Memoir

256 pages, Hardcover

First published August 11, 1995

Reviews

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

A poweful first person account of major depressive illness in an accomplished writer and art critic. As a case history from the patient's perspective, it is compelling and insightful. Beginning with a childhood in a 'house of anger' then the loss of both parents by the age of 12, Mays artfully conveys the suffering endured by those prone to depressive disorder. Few of our patients will have the ability to articulate their suffering this well.

[Scott Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mays' book on depression avoids the pollyanna'ish tendency to lecture and condescend to depressives on there always being light at the end of a dark tunnel. He doesn't set out to provide his readers with hope, because he thinks most of our therapy culture is downright, old-fashioned hucksterism. He doesn't proffer hope because he has no personal experience in promises of hope coming to fruition. It would be dishonest of him to do otherwise, although it hasn't stopped legions of other writers from ignoring the statistics.

What our therapy culture doesn't inform us is that the figures for healing depressives are depressingly low. Mays knows this. Most people who suffer from dysthymia or chronic depression know it as well. And yet, there is a billion dollar industry premised on promises of (false) hope. In a sense, the industry's predation on a depressive's need for hope is a continuation of a long and ugly history of abusing the mentally ill.

Mays died a few weeks ago and apparently of natural causes. My first thought when I heard this was "he survived" and, while I know that sounds odd, it also means something significant. To suffer a lifetime of depression, to not be familiar with happiness, to experience rage and petty grievances on a daily basis, to fear the always circling black dogs is to be relegated to a lifetime's worth of hell. Yet, he survived. I felt good when I heard how he died. It's a strange thing to write, I know. But, people who suffer from chronic depression will understand. And the truth of it is, that's all I care about here.