An author who "wrote herself" out of a psychiatric hospital has been nominated for the Orange Prize for new writers.
Clare Allan, who spent a decade in the mental health system, made the shortlist for her debut novel Poppy Shakespeare, based on her experiences.

"I had to resist the staff who treated my novelist aspirations as proof that I was delusional," the 39-year-old said.

The other nominees for the prize, to be awarded in June, are Pakistani Roopa Farooki and Canadian Karen Connelly.

Allan, whose debut novel is billed as Catch-22 meets One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, gained an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia after leaving hospital.

She became ill after moving to London in her early twenties to pursue her dream of becoming an author, but stopped writing and eating.

'Poor treatment'

"You are not valued as a human being, it's not wonder hardly anyone gets better," she said of her time in hospital.

"I believe that if you grabbed the nearest normal person off the street and put them in a psychiatric hospital, they'd be diagnosable as mad within weeks," she added.

For more information, click below

Simon
Viewpoint Webteam

PLEASE NOTE: Clare Allan also writes for the Guardian on Wednesday you can access the newspapers online here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/

SOURCE: BBC News Online