REVIEW: Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo, & Me: A Graphic Memoir (graphic novel memoir) by Ellen Forney

Marbles is a memoir, in graphic novel format, focused primarily on the time in her life when Forney was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and began working on treating it. I checked this out from the library.

Review:

I'd wanted to read this for some time due to my interest in graphic novels focused on mental health. It got bumped up in my queue when the academic library I work at started a nonbrowsable 18+ collection and this became one of the volumes included. Our 18+ collection was established in an effort to comply with Texas SB412, which is intended to make it easier to charge someone for the sale, distribution, or display of "harmful material" to a minor. "Harmful material" is defined as material whose dominant theme, taken as a whole, 1) appeals to the prurient interest of a minor in sex, nudity, or excretion, 2) is patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community as a whole with respect to what is suitable for minors, and 3) is utterly without redeeming social value for minors. All three of these criteria must be met for something to be considered "harmful material." (More info about SB412 here.)

So, let's move on to the work itself. Shortly before her thirtieth birthday, Forney was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. At the time, she was in a manic episode, feeling great, and unable to see why she needed treatment. She confidently told her psychiatrist that her manic self could help her depressive self out and prepare lots of ideas for comics and projects in advance. She was terrified that medication would destroy her creative side, and so she was determined to move forward without medication.

Then a depressive episode hit and made it clear that her manic self could not, in fact, help her depressive self out. Her manic self had forgotten exactly how bad a depressive episode could be. She stopped fighting her psychiatrist about meds and began a four-year-long journey to find the right type, combination, and dosage of meds to help herself find emotional balance.

It wasn't a smooth journey, and it involved coming to some realizations about herself, her creative work, and what she really wanted. There were times when she needed outside input - it can be hard to tell when one's emotions are "outside the normal range," so talking to her psychiatrist helped.

I assume that this ended up in our 18+ Collection because there is a section early on in the volume, during a manic phase, when Forney organizes photo shoots as reference material for future comics, including one for a porn comic she'd planned (the premise: members of a Grrl Rock band stop by a department store, try on lingeries, and have sex in the fitting room). Illustrated reproductions of the photos, featuring Forney and a couple friends acting out scenes ("admiring each other's bodies," "getting carried away," "caught by the clerk," etc.), are included. This photo shoot stuff takes up about 5 pages out of the 237 total that make up the volume. Considering the work as a whole, I firmly believe that this volume could go back into my library's regular collection and even be included in one of our displays without violating SB412. However, since we don't have any sort of reconsideration policy, I suppose it's a moot point.

So, anyway, back to the work as a whole. Mental health stuff is hard, and Forney got that across really well. Forney's worries about the effect medication would have on her, physically and creatively, were relatable - I remember having a panic attack when I was advised to try anti-anxiety meds, because who even was I without the anxiety? 

Forney researched various artists, poets, and writers who'd had mood disorders, wondering if efforts at treatment had had positive or negative effects on their creative output. The number of suicides and those who'd attempted suicide in the list scared her, and also reminded her that death is part of that "artistic output" equation - you can't create anymore if you're dead. 

I liked watching her gradually come to the realization that, yes, she really did want to become more emotionally balanced and that it didn't necessarily mean she'd become boring or less creative. She became even more honest with her psychiatrist (previously, she been unwilling to admit just how often she smoked pot, because she didn't want to be told to stop). All in all, this ended on a really positive note, while also acknowledging that Forney would be managing her bipolar disorder for the rest of her life.