That Mad Drive

Mario Valento

This fall, the University of Minnesota installed temporary chainlink fencing on the Washington Avenue Bridge to dissuade those considering suicide. Our interviewer checks in with dead poet John Berryman, who jumped from the bridge in 1972, to get his opinion.

Interviewer—John, do you think this fence will reduce the number of suicides?

Berryman—It might, if they keep it. That’s a lot of fence; you’d have ample time to think on the way up, instead of regretting on the way down. When some people want to end their lives, they’ve made up these fantasies of how it will go, and all it takes is an obstacle for them to realize the permanence of what they’re trying to do.

I—This bridge has a dark reputation. Why did it take so long for something like this to happen?

B—The bridge is Hennepin County property, so any University effort to set up fencing had to go through them. You know how it is. There’s so much red tape. It takes a crisis—like a rash of suicides, maybe two in ten days—to make authorities act. 

I—What else could the University do to prevent suicides?

B—What can’t they do? Have you ever read about aviation disasters? They’re syzygies of failures; it’s rare that a plane crashes because of one mistake. Suicides are just as fortuitously catastrophic. An intervention, however simple, at any point in someone’s life can be what saves them. On top of the usual fare—peer support, insurance coverage for mental health treatment, free resources for those in crisis, fencing and other preventive measures—there’s a wider social safety net. People need housing, food, medicine, education. Or else they slip through the cracks.

I—When a suicide happens, whose fault is it?

B—Someone’s. It could be yours. Work to make sure that isn’t the case.

I—Thanks for this, John. I mean it.

B—Stay safe, kid.

To those “so strong & so undone.”