Analysis of Susanna Kaysen in Girl Interrupted

Girl, Interrupted is a memoir written by Susanna Kaysen in 1993. In her memoir, Kaysen recalls her time spent at a psychiatric hospital after being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. Her story is told through a collection of nonlinear vignettes as she chronicles her two years spent at psychiatric hospitall and her life after her time there. Kaysen recalls that in April of 1967, as an eighteen-year-old, she was admitted to McLean Hospital in Belmont, Massachusetts after attempting suicide by overdosing on fifty aspirin pills. Kaysen recounts her suicide attempt by saying: I wasn’t a danger to society. Was I a danger to myself? The fifty aspirin--but I’ve explained them. They were metaphorical. I wanted to get rid of a certain aspect…

“Girl, Interrupted” by Susanna Kaysen is based on a true story about the author, who spent time at a mental institution called McLean Hospital in the late 1960’s. Throughout the book the author writes about her experiences at the hospital and the people she encountered while she was there. While Susanna Kaysen encountered many people at McLean, none played a major role in the conflict that arises in the book, which is Susanna being sent to the institution and having to face her mental illness.…

Susanna Kaysen wrote the book “Girl, Interrupted” as an autobiography describing her time spent in a mental hospital. The book gives great insight into those suffering from Borderline Personality Disorder, as well as some of the other patients residing at McLean psychiatric hospital. The hospital was notorious for it’s somewhat famous visitors the list including but not limited to: Sylvia Plath, John Forbes Nash, Robert Lowell, and singer James Taylor. Susanna spent her time at Mclean beginning…

novel, Girl, Interrupted the author Susanna Kaysen, examines what her life was like being labeled crazy and put in a mental hospital for two years in the 1960’s. In this essay, the treatment of Susanna will be evaluated in comparison to the other patients. The ways that Susanna is biased in her writing will also be examined. Finally, the mental instability of Susanna and the other patients will be compared and contrasted.…

that wanted to kill herself, that dragged me into the suicide debate” (37). Her psychosis is immediately apparent here as she explains how her mind is absent from her actions, and she complains that she is constantly trapped between 2 ideas. Kaysen is at a constant battle within herself, but refuses to believe that anything is severely wrong with…

This disorder is usually diagnosed to individuals, males or females, who are in adolescence or early adulthood, just like Susanna. Sometimes, early symptoms of borderline personality disorder can occur during an individual’s childhood. Susanna showed many symptoms that included extreme reactions, rocky relationships with family and peers, distorted sense of self-image, impulsive behaviors, suicidal thoughts and chronic feelings of complete emptiness (Borderline Personality Disorder,…

female identities can be observed through extreme representations of teenage girls in films. Additionally, these female identities are important elements of…