Many blogs will give you lists of famous writers who had ADHD. These writers were never diagnosed during their lifetime – honestly, we’re still not good at recognizing ADHD, especially in women, so we certainly weren’t able to diagnose them a hundred years ago – but rather, someone felt that they exhibited ADHD-like symptoms posthumously. I, however, am not a psychiatrist. In this post, therefore, I will not be able to say for a fact whether these authors were actually famous women writers with ADHD or not.Â
But I am an ADHD writing coach. So what I will be able to do for you is look at three famous women who, according to others, may have had ADHD. I’ve written a post before about famous writers with ADHD, but that one did not include women. And that just doesn’t seem right! So together, let’s see whether we can turn Virginia Woolf, Emily Dickinson and Agatha Christie into role models for the female ADHD writer. What can we learn from these famous women writers with ADHD?Â
Virginia Woolf's scatterbrained writing style
According to Neurolaunch, many experts now believe Virgina Woolf had ADHD. This famous writer is both a feminist and lesbian icon as well as a wildly successful essayist and novelist, whose books have been translated into 50 languages. Still, she struggled with self-doubt to such an extent that she tried to take her own life in 1913, believing her sister despised her and her husband didn’t love her. This was not her only suicide attempt, and she finally took her own life in 1941. Though this self-doubt and suicidal tendency can be attributed to bipolar disorder – another diagnosis she received posthumously – it’s not an unfamiliar feeling for many ADHDers either!Â
In fact, there is a strong link between bipolar disorder and ADHD. Additude magazine reports that 1 in 13 patients with ADHD has comorbid BD, and up to 1 in 6 patients with BD has comorbid ADHD. What’s more, these often get misdiagnosed, or rather, the simultaneous occurrence is not recognized because only one diagnosis already explains so many of the symptoms.Â
What we can learn from the first of our famous women writers with ADHD
Her fear of being unloved and her depressive episodes, however, aren’t the only reason why people think Virginia Woolf had ADHD. In fact, it is her writing itself that gives that impression. Neurolaunch writes on their blog:
Woolf’s innovative writing style, which captured the fluid, often disjointed nature of human thought, could be seen as a literary manifestation of the ADHD mind’s tendency to jump rapidly between ideas and associations.
If you’ve ever felt that your jumpy trains of thought only led to miscommunication, and preclude you from achieving literary success: think again! Virginia Woolf is seen as inventive for introducing a stream-of-thought writing style into novel writing, and is now considered one of the most famous writers in the world. Whether she was actually one of the famous women writers with ADHD or not, Virginia Woolf’s troubled brain made her what she is today: beloved by millions.Â
Emily Dickinson's genius in isolation
One of America’s most famous poets, Emily Dickinson is said to have been one of our famous women writers with ADHD. As with both the male and female writers who were posthumously diagnosed, her boundless creativity and unconventional style and structure are seen as signs of her neurodivergent, ADHD mind. On this basis alone, however, there’s not much point in including her in this post on famous women writers with ADHD. After all, I’d just repeat the same thing time and again with every author!Â
Genius in isolation
But there are more reasons to believe she may have been neurodivergent. Most prominent is her often-discussed isolationism. Emily Dickinson rarely left her childhood home, and many authors have speculated about the reason. An ADHD diagnosis could help explain her isolation, pointing to heightened sensitivity and possibly resulting social anxiety. That would definitely make her one of the most famous women writers with ADHD.
However, just as with Virginia Woolf, ADHD has also been read into Emily Dickinson’s work itself. Not only have people found further evidence of her sensitivity in her highly evocative way of describing the sensory world, there’s something ADHD-ish about her descriptions themselves as well. Prominent ADHD expert Dr. Ned Hallowell said on his podcast:Â
If you want an example of a famous person who I'm pretty sure has this condition: Emily Dickinson [...] arguably America's greatest poet of all time and the way she wrote you can just see you can see her ADD. You know, she talks about mercury rolling on the floor and it's the [...] mind of ADD dispersing in different directions, like little balls of mercury, if you've ever dropped mercury out of a thermometer
So what can we learn from Emily Dickinson?
One thing that’s a relief for me personally, while reading about Dickinson, is that apparently you don’t have to be an extrovert to become one of the famous women writers with ADHD. It’s okay to maintain most of your intimate relationships from home, through the written word (Dickinson was a notorious letter writer). What’s more, the same sensitivity that might make it hard for you to feel safe in the world can actually be your greatest strength as a writer!Â
And then, of course, there’s her famous use of the em-dash. I’m a huge fan of this punctuation mark – as you can see all through my blog posts! But it also fits with one of my favorite classifications for ADHD writer. Are you an em-dash or a brackets kind of writer? Whichever you are, you will have noticed that every thought comes with an additional bonus thought. And that makes Emily’s beloved em-dash, in my view, the most ADHD punctuation mark of all.  famous women writers with ADHD
Agatha Christie's eye for patterns
Known for her murder mysteries, Agatha Christie is created a very recognizable (and neurodivergent) detective, Poirot, whose eye for detail helped him solve locked-room crimes. Though not presenting with OCD herself, according to Psych Central, Christie was diagnosed with ADHD.Â
I have to be honest: I’m not entirely convinced myself. Many people online seem to deduce this from the fact she had problems in school… But not everyone who struggles in school necessarily has ADHD. I do believe she had dyslexia and possibly dysgraphia, which, again, are often comorbid with ADHD. “Comorbidities” really is the theme of this post, isn’t it?!?
So what can we learn from Agatha Christie?Â
We’ll never be able to find out for certain whether Agatha Christie had ADHD or not. But she still seems to have had neurodivergent traits that can make her a role model for us, who aspire to one day join these famous women writers with ADHD! One thing that stands out in particular, is Christie’s talent for pattern recognition.Â
Yes, it’s true that it’s mostly Poirot, her fictional detective, who did all the deductions based on patterns. But she would still have had to come up with them! And that means that she managed to turn one of our main strengths as ADHD writers into a tool to write 66 detective novels! If that isn’t inspirational, I don’t know what is.Â
Concluding thoughts on famous women writers with ADHD
Will we ever know for certain whether these actually were famous women writers with ADHD or whether they weren’t actually one of us? No, probably not. But I’m not sure that is the point of this whole exercise.Â
We don’t look to these women to represent ADHD, we look to them for inspiration, for the hope that if they managed to overcome their challenges – depressive and suicidal episodes, a need to lock yourself inside your childhood home for decades, and problems experienced during your time in the education system – so can we! These three women are celebrated BECAUSE they were different, not despite it. They reinvented genres and turned what society perceived to be problems into strengths.Â
Whether you want to finally find legal use for your extensive knowledge of poisons, want to invent new and exciting ways to use the em-dash, or aim to change the world, one essay at a time: you could do worse than to take these famous women writers with ADHD (or maybe not) as your role models. Â
Are you ready to turn your difference into your strength?
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