I wish it were as easy as that to reach a correct diagnosis for any kind of mental illness.
Jansy,
Of course I'm not making a diagnosis - - nor is Shade a clinical case history, just a character in a fiction by - - well, Mr U-no-hu. The literary use of multiple personality (or not) has nothing to do with the actual practice of psychiatry.
Which reminds me - - checking on versipel in the archives I came across a reference to the Latin word versipellis which sent me to the Encyclopedia Britannica article on Lycanthropy. I was interested to learn that there are references in the literature to the use of drugs ... And all this time I thought this was an invention of RLS!
The appearance of versipellis in the EB article of course was a possible source for VN's knowledge of the word. But that would suggest he was interested in lycanthropy ...
Carolyn