After seeing this great film, I Googled around trying find some science behind the theory that wind can drive you crazy. Aside from some Tibetian documents, there's very little.
As a Montana resident (and I've also heard about this from Wyoming) there's plenty of folk lore and anecdotal reports of people going crazy during chinook winds, especially when they blow steadily for several days.
Funny, though, that no one's done any serious research on it.
Keep in mind that it wasn't the wind alone that affected Letty (Lillian Gish). She shot and killed a man. Granted, he was her rapist. Even so, she was still guilty of taking a life. Would anyone believe that he had raped her? If they did, would they think her actions justified? In spite of the rape, did she herself feel the killing was justified? She didn't want the body around so she dragged it outside and buried it. The wind, however, kept blowing the sand/dirt off the body. Think of what kind of effect that would have on someone. I recall it being rather disturbing to see the wind blow the sand away and let his face appear from the ground. Her guilt -- and I'm not saying that I think she was guilty. I was actually happy when she shot him. -- but what she perceived as her guilt had a lot to do with Letty losing her sanity.
Spin
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I'm watching it again, two years since my OP, and there's a reference to "windsanity" early in the film and the Indian lore of the northers.
As noted above, there are physical effects to long exposure to high winds... likely there's psychological effects too.
(We just had a norther come through Montana yesterday -- 90 mph gusts, which fed "sleeper" forest fires ignited from earlier lightning strikes.)
Anyway, sometimes Mother Nature comes in, disrupts our sheltered lives and makes us all a bit uneasy and scared. And maybe it's enough to push some of us over the edge.
It was justifiable homicide. Her tormentor's aggresions, crimes, and the windsanity (the reason for an insanity plea) and possibly a DNA case would be raised in today's trials. Back then, they would hang her.
shareljspin says > Keep in mind that it wasn't the wind alone that affected Letty (Lillian Gish). She shot and killed a man. Granted, he was her rapist. Even so, she was still guilty of taking a life...Everything you say is, of course, true but Letty demonstrated signs of 'wind madness' long before she killed and buried her rapist. Naturally, her torment escalated following the events of that unfortunate night but prior to that she was already pretty far gone.
I could easily see someone go crazy from weeks or months in that type of wind. It would be hard to sleep as every gust sounds like the roof was going to blow off or a window going to break. Plus it is the ccnstant noise
sharePlus it is the ccnstant noise
I believe it was the harsh life on the prairie, especially death, that caused insanity. It was mistakenly thought that the wind caused it because it was such an obvious feature of life on the prairie. I think its a little like the belief that hysteria was so common in women because it was endemic to womanhood. Now it is believed that sexual and physical abuse was the real problem; hysteria was only a symptom of the trauma.
shareon a separate note, this movie really reminded me of another movie called Woman In The Dunes, which also deals with similar themes
i wonder if the Director of Woman In The Dunes was inspired by this
so many movies, so little time