"It is all well and good that people who have "problems" have somehow been able to get the help they need and a platform from which to trumpet it, but, really, aren't we basically celebrating failure here? There's a reason you don't read memoirs from the guy who finished fourth in every race: He couldn't cut it, and there's enough of that in life already. Show me a recovery memoir and I will show you a story about a quitter, someone who refuses to make a serious commitment and gives up when things get a little unpleasant. Basically, every book about a reformed addict is Sarah Palin's Going Rogue but with more self-aware debasement at the beginning. Where is the recognition for the people who stick it out and deal with their problems the way that they're supposed to: with drugs and booze?"
Good one. Didn't Sartre do most of his work suspended between uppers and pot? Not to mention that without alcohoool, there would not have been much American lit.
Joanna