Wildly Insane: wilderness and man

I've been listening to an old radio program about Gavin Maxwell and his life. Many of you will know he wrote the book Ring of Bright Water and not so many of you will realise what a socially secluded life he really did lead. Radio 4's In the Ring of Bright Water presented by Terry Nutkins.

I only new the name of Gavin Maxwell, I was actually more interested in Terry Nutkins, I recall him from different Wildlife Programs and activities in the 1990s. I hadn't a clue about the way these two completely different -and yet similar people in certain ways on reflection- lived. It's to do with the lifestyle they tried to have. Set in the furthest reaches, bleakness and open landscape that Britain can hold cut off on an island and only surrounded by animals.

Its said that Gavin Maxwell suffered in his youth and never truly stopped being a child in many ways and so enjoyed the solitude. Then there is Terry Nutkins who finally after living with Gavin in his childhood decided the area was so beautiful and reminded him of the past he went back to live at another property on the Island. Only a curse is said to have been put on Gavin Maxwell for the suffering of Kathleen Maxwell had, 'causing' his death.

Sobering most certainly, but as environmentally interested as we all are, is there a boundary we should keep? I get the impression that living in complete wilderness will send you mad. That's 'mad' in the terminology of the 19th Century, when no one understood psychological illness. Harken back to the days, are we as environmentally interested people to be doomed if we close the doors to the rest of human society? It seems there is a certain trait which exists in some environmentally interested people. Yet, doctors used to say things like he needs to have a break from life, for mental breakdowns I recommend spending sometime in the country or to that effect.

Now with so much development in mental health can these issues carry on happening, is the environment a cause or effect of madness. For those of us who like the outdoors are we doomed to some form of insanity or is it the effect of being out there so much. Come 2050-2060 when dementia has risen I wonder what life will be like.