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Mental Illness In Susan Henderson's Up From The Blue

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Recommended: Essay on the 1970s

To me, a book filled with intriguing truth and insight to past or present real world events is a great book. Up From The Blue, written by Susan Henderson, is a perfect example of this as I found it to be extremely informative and enjoyable. The author has a great perception of a child’s mindset in which she portrayed greatly through the main character, Tillie. The book also provides lots of knowledge about the social life and change which occurred in the 1970’s era. As well, it brought a realistic view of mental illness and its affects.
First, the characterization of Tillie, the main character and daughter, is incredible as Henderson has a great sense of how a child in her shoes should act. Her strengths come from managing to deal with the …show more content…

Tillie’s mother suffered from sever manic-depression. She is unable to do much as she is always so overwhelmed with sadness. Her depression gets the best of her when caring for Tillie, as it forces her to give up. In her younger days, she used to give Tillie MEDICINE before bedtime to not have to deal with her. QUOTE ABOUT DRINKING. Towards the end of the story, Tillie and her brother find their mother floating in the pool; she committed suicide due to the lack of help she is given for her mental illness. She had felt a burden to the family and believed they were better off without her. QUOTE FROM FAMILY ABOUT SUICIDE. This isn 't the best time or place in history to have a breakdown so she never received the proper care she needed. This has dramatic impacts on the family because they 're simply blindsided and confused by what 's happening. Since there wasn 't a name for it, the father reaches for words like "lazy," "stubborn," and "helpless" to describe her.
In conclusion, Up From The Blue was a great book since Henderson was able to fit real life issues into a heartwarming and heartbreaking story. She touched on the mindset of a child, the lifestyle in the 1970’s, and mental illness altogether. Not only did she inform of these topics, but she attached feelings to what was happening, providing insight and somewhat harsh truth to the events taking

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