For hundred of years, the term “Madness” or “Mentally ill” has been used as a universal account to describe all peculiar or disturbing human behavior that society cannot normalize (Gomory, Tomi, David Cohen, and Stuart A. Kirk). Different types of peculiar behaviors can be classified as a mental illness. “ In Lovesick, Frank Tallis, believes that we can best define love as a mental illness.” He claims that passion-love harbours various psychiatric disorders. Some disorders include: obsessive-compulsive disorder, when someone in love has obsessive thoughts about his or her beloved; clinical depression, when he or she experiences melancholy for his or her loved one; anorexia, when someone loses appetite as a result; panic disorder, when someone feels nervous before a date; bipolar disorder; people oscillate between manic and despair; and lastly love can cause people to be addicted (Pease, Susan).
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However, love might not be the cause of madness itself but the "frustration of thwarted emotions could result in odd behavior”(Houston, R.A). Examples of “love-madness” exist in court cases and asylum documents demonstrate that this pattern exists for both men and women. “Among 28 female and 22 male entrants to Dundee Asylum in its first-year ‘disappointment in love' was said to be the cause of the lunacy of one young person of each sex” (Houston, R.A, 322). For both sexes, love could also be a symptom. However, in literature and film this perception of “love-madness” is increasingly gendered. A stigma exists that this madness due to ‘love melancholy' is a feminine quality. Although, men also experience this madness throughout literature it is more common among females and if a male experiences such symptoms they become more feminine (Houston, R.A,
However, love might not be the cause of madness itself but the "frustration of thwarted emotions could result in odd behavior”(Houston, R.A). Examples of “love-madness” exist in court cases and asylum documents demonstrate that this pattern exists for both men and women. “Among 28 female and 22 male entrants to Dundee Asylum in its first-year ‘disappointment in love' was said to be the cause of the lunacy of one young person of each sex” (Houston, R.A, 322). For both sexes, love could also be a symptom. However, in literature and film this perception of “love-madness” is increasingly gendered. A stigma exists that this madness due to ‘love melancholy' is a feminine quality. Although, men also experience this madness throughout literature it is more common among females and if a male experiences such symptoms they become more feminine (Houston, R.A,