Synaesthesia
BMJ 2010; 340 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.b4616 (Published 08 January 2010) Cite this as: BMJ 2010;340:b4616
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With Baudelaire and Verlaine, Rimbaud belongs to the “poètes maudits”
or more globally, with Oscar Wilde and many more to the “decadent
movement” (1). He was born into a poor and non artistic family, but was
brilliant at school, his first poems being written when he was 15. He had
a violent love affair with poet Paul Verlaine, ending in a quarrel, where
Rimbaud was wounded by a shot from his lover. He died at 37 of bone
cancer, but stopped writing poetry at the age of 21. One of the poems
which is often taught in schools, and is to be found in many anthologies
is Voyelles (2). The first verse is:
A noir, E blanc, I rouge, U vert, O bleu : voyelles,
At school, one is taught that this is a culmination of poetic
freedom, might it just be synaesthesia ?
(1)http://en.wikipedia.org.ezproxy.ulb.ac.be/wiki/Arthur_Rimbaud#External_l...
(2)
Full french version on :
http://mv.ezproxy.com.ezproxy.ulb.ac.be/lesgrandsclassiques/poemes/arthu...
Full translation into English:
http://mv.ezproxy.com.ezproxy.ulb.ac.be/r/the_vowels.html
Competing interests:
None declared
Competing interests: No competing interests
I read with interest your article on synaesthesia. I have this
ability/?disability myself and always imagine days of the week; months of
the year; letters and numbers as different colours. As stated in your
article , I did not realise until well into adult life that this was
anything but universal.
Colleagues have always commented on my excellent memory . This is
particularly noticable with dates; numbers (such as entry codes to locked
doors and patient's names). This is because I remember colour patterns
associated with the number; letter or date sequence.
Recently I noticed that junior colleagues were surprised that I could
enter an 8 digit number and letter code in a variety of sequences as the
order was dependent on where I started my "colour pattern". This led me to
wonder whether this ability to put numbers and letters in different
sequences which I see as identical maybe the basisof some forms of
dyslexia. Personally I have not had this difficulty but I can imagine that
it may cause confusion to some individuals.
Competing interests:
None declared
Competing interests: No competing interests
Other Visual Perceptual Phenomenon
Synaesthesia is a fascinating phenomenon. As Eagleman (1) says,
patients do get mistakenly diagnosed to have schizophrenia. Synaesthesia
has also been associated with use of hallucinogens like Lysergic acid
diethylamide (LSD) and mescaline(2).
Perceptual experiences in patients may present in any field of
medicine and awareness can help in early diagnosis.
For example, in ‘Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder’,
patients re-experience, following having stopped using the hallucinogen,
one or more of the perceptual symptoms that were experienced while
intoxicated with the hallucinogen (e.g., geometric hallucinations, false
perceptions of movement in the peripheral visual fields, flashes of
colours, intensified colours, trails of images of moving objects, positive
afterimages, halos around objects, macropsia, and micropsia(3). Some
patients report persistence of episodes for many years after having
discontinued the hallucinogen.
In Charles Bonnet syndrome, people with visual impairment present
with complex visual hallucinations. Reassurance to the patient that it is
a benign condition and not mental illness has powerful therapeutic
effect(4).
We are once again reminded that there is no short cut to
taking a good history.
References
1. Eagleman DM. Editorial.Synaesthesia .BMJ 2010;340:b4616 (Jan 8)
2. Ramachandran V.S.1; Hubbard E.M.Synaesthesia -- A window into
perception, thought and language. Journal of Consciousness Studies, Volume
8, Number 12, 2001 , pp. 3-34(32)
3. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. (DSM-
IV)American Psychiatric Association.1994
4.Menon G, Rahman I, Menon.S,Dutton.G.Complex Visual Hallucinations
in the Visually Impaired The Charles Bonnet Syndrome.Survey of
Ophthalmology, Volume 48, Issue 1, Pages 58-72,2003
Competing interests:
None declared
Competing interests: No competing interests