graphomania

/ˌɡɹæfəˈmeɪni.ə/

Etymology

From grapho- + -mania.

graphomania means the compulsion to write. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 87 out of 100.

Why this word is great

GRAPHOMANIA — [Noun] An obsessive compulsion or morbid desire to write. From the combining form grapho- (from Greek graphein, "to write") and -mania (from Greek mania, "madness, frenzy"). Unlike logorrhea, a torrent of spoken, often incoherent words, or the narrowly clinical scribomania, graphomania centers on the physical tyranny of the blank page—the scriptural act itself as a driven necessity. It is the hand moving ceaselessly across a legal pad long after the mind has emptied, the frantic etching of words into a fogged windowpane, and the surrealist's surrender to an automatic pen pursuing meaning in mere marks. This is the quiet madness born from the terror that to stop writing is to cease to exist.

noun

The compulsion to write.“Wagner’s graphomania is shown not only by the substance, but also by the outward form of his writings.”
Used as part of the name of various surrealist techniques, e.g., a method in which dots are made at the sites of impurities in a blank sheet of paper, and lines are then made between the dots; see "Entoptic graphomania".“A devoted explorer of decalcomania, fumage, frottage, collage and other methods of pictorial automatism, Colquhoun invented several magic-inspired techniques of her own, including graphomania, stillomania, and parsemage.”