Sequels of ’95 : A Painful Story to Tell, but a Rewarding Response

How does it feel, Dr. Kay Redfield Jamison, to have told the world your own personal story, the story of a world-famous expert on manic depression who turns out to have suffered from the disease for her entire adult life? (“A Student of Moods--by Necessity,” Oct. 12).

“How does it feel having my guts all over the pavement?” Jamison asks with a laugh.

After two months of lecturing and touring to promote her memoir, “An Unquiet Mind” (Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), Jamison returned to her Washington, D.C., office to a mountain of letters from manic-depressives and their families thanking her for unmasking the disease. A dozen or so letters are from people crediting Jamison with saving their lives by pushing them into treatment. “Those are particularly gratifying,” Jamison says.

For the most part, her peers have been no less positive. Associates from near and far have called to tell Jamison that reading about manic depression as it affects someone they know and respect is a great deal more complicated than hearing about it from their own patients.

Like many authors, Jamison first vowed never to connect another verb and noun in print. But soon an idea was dancing in her head. Aimed at young readers, “Violet in Black and White,” will tell the story of a feisty, feminine veterinarian who happens to be a skunk.