An irresistible thirst for the illusion of one’s power, faith acquired for short periods in one’s ability to fill the void of loneliness and turn back time, the desire to forget about the failures that haunt you and the series of losses that make up existence: all this brings together two addictions to creating an imaginary alternatives to life are art, in particular literature, and alcoholism. The British writer Olivia Lang tried to consider these addictions, these equally powerful over those who acquired them, and equally destructive addictions for them through each other, showing several famous examples - Ernest Hemingway, Francis Scott Fitzgerald, Tennessee Williams, John Berryman, John Cheever, Raymond Carver - how the illusion of paradise and the painful awareness of its impossibility are intertwined in creativity.