Insane Robert [Schumann] 1810-1856
Poor Schumann went insane.  He went to an asylum in 1854, but not before he wrote some great music (and some great letters).
Pre-committed Robert. Still looks odd
In addition to hearing voices, he also apparently heard the note A for quite a while.  In an 1854 letter he wrote to Joseph Joachim, he says something along the lines of "Music is silent now.  Externally at any rate."  [no, I don't have the source. You'll just have to trust me.]
The worst drawing - EVER!
I confess, is one of the worst doodles I have committed to paper- notebook paper or not. You can see that I crossed it out - that means something.  I crossed it out because he looks like Alban Berg! But I had the right idea - he is playing hand puppets with his two musical imaginary characters Florestan and Eusebius (some pianists know them from Carnaval op. 9, but they appeared in his writings more often.)  Good for Robert to make such use of his alter egos, eh?  Florestan is saying something like "Talent labors, genius creates"... Eusebius trailed off when I realized how bad the doodle was.
This, -->
Alas! poor Robert!  The stress, etc finally got to him, and he tried to commit suicide by throwing himself into the Rhine river in Feb 1854.

Now being the irreverent, callous person that I am, I couldn't help but draw this one on the right. When  Robert was younger he had tried to improve his piano playing by creating some machine that actually injured his right hand to the point where he could NOT play in public.  So this is immediately my thought on hearing that his suicide attempt was not successful because he was saved by fishermen:  "Ah, poor incompetent Robert - knowing him he probably threw himself into the fishing boat!" (I did label 'boat' as you can see if you look hard enough.)
Clara Schumann makes her cameo too.
Back: this site owner is more insane than Robert!
But first see the real picture of Pirate Robert (note the earring!)