“Award winning pianist, Nick Van Bloss, had his career destroyed mid-performance by his Tourette’s Syndrome. Struck by the illness as a child, music became his salvation as focussing on the piano keys held his tics at bay. Nick now needs to know why this has happened to him. Tourette’s ruined his career, but did it also create it? The spectre of the ‘mad-genius’ has gripped our imagination for years, but is it real? This program looks at the latest evidence that links creativity and disorder. It also unveils the extraordinary world of Tourette’s Syndrome and compares it with the symptoms of autism, schizophrenia and bi-polar. The program features an interview with world acclaimed neurologist, Dr Oliver Sacks.”

The most interesting topic in the show for me was the discussion of the influence of the chemical dopamine on the urge to create. It was suggested that the imbalance of dopamine, that is, an overabundance of it, corresponded with an increased urge to create. Keep in mind that the creation itself was not necessarily good–it didn’t increase the person’s skill–but it did create this unbearable desire to create, or write, or paint, or play music. Which of course got me to thinking about a whole range of things: from being quite terrified that my own love of writing and creation could be simulated by a simple chemical imbalance, to possible commerical applications for a dopamine tablet that would help writers past their writer’s block, and onward and upward to conspiracy theories of music industries with vast vats of songwriters on constant dopamine drips defining what our pop music will be for the next million years.

Yes, I get slightly carried away with these thoughts.

…but it is  something to keep in mind (ha ha).

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