I was just reminded that today is World Mental Health Day. You just have to look at the Wikipedia entry to see how important this is. I thought I might take a little time to moan about how badly mental health is represented in my favourite art form - pretty much any mention of a diagnosable illness in a character will become a major plot point, and they'll probably end up dead or killing someone by the last act - before I remembered that there is a major festival rocking Scotland at the moment that is trying to dispel some of the half-baked notions that surround mental illness.

Incidentally, I am currently on a big kick about the correct use of language. I saw this poster the other day which was trying to recruit students for a charity. In big letters, it asked whether I was ambitious, results-orientated and "interpersonal." Realising that none of these qualities are really necessary for handing out cups of tea to homeless people, I decided that the world has finally sacrificed meaning for the handy phrase that can be slapped on the CV, and even charities have given up pretending that anybody joins up for altruistic reasons.

So even the name of World Mental Health Day annoys me. I'd prefer "World Mental Illness Awareness Day." Then again, I read a few obituaries of Thomas Szasz last month, and have no idea this month whether the category of "mental illness" has any meaning. In all this confusion, writing a blog post to celebrate the one day a year that Mental Health is given a calendar note has become impossible.

I thought I might list the various "positive" representations of mental illness in the arts. So far, I have come up with Song of the Silent Snow by Hubert Selby (man is depressed, family are sensitive, man goes for a walk, feels a bit better) and Donnie Darko. I am not even that sure about the second choice: Donnie sees big white rabbits and gets into what might be a fantasy about time travel - before getting squashed by a falling aeroplane engine - but there's an authentic touch that reveals how his medication is being increased that is subtle and, dear God, recognisable from life.

And I really can't be bothered to list the negative representations, especially when they come under "generic non-diagnosable madness" that frequently stands in place of those unimportant factors that character or purpose.

Instead, I am going to direct readers to The Scottish Mental Health Art and Film Festival.