The Celebration Of Self Destruction In The Series 'Fleabag'

How to live a good life in Fleebag's way.

Fleabag (Phoebe Waller-Bridge) is a hedonistic young lady whose fractured relationships with her family have been triggered by her incapability to cope with the deaths of her mother, and more lately her best friend. The café they co-owned is struggling and her relationship appears to have come to an everlasting end. She struggles to make legitimate connections with everybody without us, the audience. It's simply funnier all round though, even higher written, extra transferring and, as it seems at the second that this is all we're ever going to get, tinged with a bittersweet unhappiness - especially in the remaining moments.

Activities for Self Destruction Throughout the Series

Mental illness isn’t pretty or something fascinating. It can't be an easy tweet to share, or a poem. It’s nasty, negative and destructive. One of the many issues in representation of mental illness is that creators generally try to tidy up illness. In efforts to try and write a correct portrayal, some writers seek advice from literature that lists the signs of illnesses; in principle this is extremely good practice and more writers must make an effort to seek advice from specialists on what they’re writing, mainly with something as subtle as intellectual illness.

For this reason, I think the gloriously messy and chaotic story of Fleabag is a remarkable representation for people who simply aren’t okay.

Fleabag doesn’t try to exhibit a personality that suits a class of mental illness. Fleabag can’t be easily defined. She is layered, she is real, she is a disaster. She is genuinely sick however it is not completely clear how. Instead, Fleabag is introduced as chaotic and self-destructive, which is a symptom of many disorders.

We see a lot of moves from Fleabag that can be described as reckless, specifically in her relationship to sex. There are a few interpretations for Fleabag’s use of sex as both a coping mechanism and an act of self harm. Perhaps sex is the solely expression of intimacy and affection she approves herself, possibly she uses the act as a distraction from her internal misery, or perhaps she simply does not care what happens to her body.

Although self-destruction is a symptom of a much deeper issue, the show does not allow Fleabag to be completely exonerated from her actions.