Madness in Seventeenth-century Autobiography

Many early modern writers left accounts of their spiritual sufferings and convictions which deal in extremes of emotion and behavior--some identified by their contemporaries as mad, to be treated with medication, counseling, and confinement. Their writings give us a window into the hidden world of early modern madness from the point of view of the mad. How is madness experienced and treated, and how can it be recorded? How do religion, gender, and class inflect the processes of diagnosis and treatment? And what insights can the stories these writers tell give us into early modern culture?

Katharine Hodgkin is with the University of East London.

PART I: MADNESS, WRITING, HISTORY * Introduction: Studying the History of Madness * Writing the Mad Self * PART II: EARLY MODERN MADNESS (i): THE DISORDERED MIND * Being Mad: Melancholy, Distraction and Confusion of Mind * Madness and the Feminine * Doctors and Patients * PART III: EARLY MODERN MADNESS (ii): RELIGION AND THE SELF * The Christian Self: Problems of Hypocrisy and Despair * Mad unto the World: Mid-Century Enthusiasm * PART IV: MIND AND BODY: MADNESS AND THE SELF * Inside and Outside: The Body and its Boundaries * Beyond the Human Body * Love and Power: The Self and Others * Outward and Inward: The Self in Motion PART I: MADNESS, WRITING, HISTORY * Introduction: Studying the History of Madness * Writing the Mad Self * PART II: EARLY MODERN MADNESS (i): THE DISORDERED MIND * Being Mad: Melancholy, Distraction and Confusion of Mind * Madness and the Feminine * Doctors and Patients * PART III: EARLY MODERN MADNESS (ii): RELIGION AND THE SELF * The Christian Self: Problems of Hypocrisy and Despair * Mad unto the World: Mid-Century Enthusiasm * PART IV: MIND AND BODY: MADNESS AND THE SELF * Inside and Outside: The Body and its Boundaries * Beyond the Human Body * Love and Power: The Self and Others * Outward and Inward: The Self in Motion