On interior landscapes1: Thinking with Ilyas, the Imam, and Stefania Pandolfo
Anthropology & Humanism August 30, 2024 Atreyee Majumder 1 citation
Psychosis is an inner journey across an isthmus between the sensible world and the divine mystery, leaving the self as a ruin. The author reflects on their own psychotic episodes, which involved hallucinations of war and a dream of Krishna, and connects them to the experiences of Ilyas, a patient in Stefania Pandolfo's ethnographic work. Ilyas's murals and the author's writings from a psych ward are residues of an experience that confounds pain and pleasure. Islamic theological concepts like nafs, qalb, and barzakh provide a vocabulary for this interior topography. Recovery is a return to normalcy, but the self remains haunted by the crossing, a faultline in consciousness forever.