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A review by aegagrus
The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton by Karl Hagen, D. Moynihan, Distributed Proofreaders, Robert Burton
Giving this book a numerical rating strikes me as a somewhat pointless exercise; to read the Anatomy of Melancholy is to sojourn in the distinct literary culture of the 17th century. Four centuries removed from the relevant notions of readership, I cannot pass a fair judgement.
By the standards of any age, though, the Anatomy of Melancholy is a singular book. Its titanic aspirations melt away genre, form, or topic, and produce something entirely sui generis. To the modern reader, it is often a frustrating work, filled with winding digressions, extravagant inventories of quotation and anecdote, distended sentences which reach towards their meaning by heaping clauses upon clauses upon clauses. It is also an inspiring book. The reader glimpses both the force and intensity of Burton's polymath intellect (polymaths having been banished from our age in favor of "generalists"), and his sincerity, humanity, and evident good intent.
The Anatomy's most powerful feature is its irrepressibly holistic approach to melancholy. We have described and circumscribed depression as a clinical phenomenon; we look to the particular and the distinct. For Burton, melancholy is at once a political problem, a social problem, a spiritual problem, an environmental problem, a physical illness, and a mental illness, all of which he takes seriously. He is interested in the relationship between the patient, the patient's friends and family, the doctor, the medicine or treatment, the surrounding context, and God. This interconnection makes his work challenging and relevant to our era of neatly compartmentalized problems and solutions.
The Anatomy's archaic form also belies deeply sophisticated ideas about the relationship between physical and mental illness, the role of memory and trauma, the social role and limitations of medicine, and the infinite heterogeneity of mental illness. Reading and relating to 17th-century accounts of what we would now call depression is cathartic and powerful. Burton's warnings against the romantic appeals of sadness and solitude also feel very contemporary. These relevant interventions are all the more challenging as we remember that Burton, like others of his age, associated all of this with a literal physical substance, choler (also called black bile, also called melancholy itself).
I would not recommend reading this book in its entirety to very many people. In all honesty, I finished it out of stubbornness. The modern reader is often frustrated by its frequent use of classical languages and verse, its heavily repetitious nature, and its many digressions (some of which read as either irrelevant, like the arcane sections on astrology or demonology, or backwards, like the diatribes against Catholics and heathens, or certain lurid descriptions of women's improprieties).
Nonetheless, the Anatomy of Melancholy is a singular and important book. I found a lot of meaning and substance while wading through it, and I am confident the book should be more known and more discussed, even when not read in its entirety.
By the standards of any age, though, the Anatomy of Melancholy is a singular book. Its titanic aspirations melt away genre, form, or topic, and produce something entirely sui generis. To the modern reader, it is often a frustrating work, filled with winding digressions, extravagant inventories of quotation and anecdote, distended sentences which reach towards their meaning by heaping clauses upon clauses upon clauses. It is also an inspiring book. The reader glimpses both the force and intensity of Burton's polymath intellect (polymaths having been banished from our age in favor of "generalists"), and his sincerity, humanity, and evident good intent.
The Anatomy's most powerful feature is its irrepressibly holistic approach to melancholy. We have described and circumscribed depression as a clinical phenomenon; we look to the particular and the distinct. For Burton, melancholy is at once a political problem, a social problem, a spiritual problem, an environmental problem, a physical illness, and a mental illness, all of which he takes seriously. He is interested in the relationship between the patient, the patient's friends and family, the doctor, the medicine or treatment, the surrounding context, and God. This interconnection makes his work challenging and relevant to our era of neatly compartmentalized problems and solutions.
The Anatomy's archaic form also belies deeply sophisticated ideas about the relationship between physical and mental illness, the role of memory and trauma, the social role and limitations of medicine, and the infinite heterogeneity of mental illness. Reading and relating to 17th-century accounts of what we would now call depression is cathartic and powerful. Burton's warnings against the romantic appeals of sadness and solitude also feel very contemporary. These relevant interventions are all the more challenging as we remember that Burton, like others of his age, associated all of this with a literal physical substance, choler (also called black bile, also called melancholy itself).
I would not recommend reading this book in its entirety to very many people. In all honesty, I finished it out of stubbornness. The modern reader is often frustrated by its frequent use of classical languages and verse, its heavily repetitious nature, and its many digressions (some of which read as either irrelevant, like the arcane sections on astrology or demonology, or backwards, like the diatribes against Catholics and heathens, or certain lurid descriptions of women's improprieties).
Nonetheless, the Anatomy of Melancholy is a singular and important book. I found a lot of meaning and substance while wading through it, and I am confident the book should be more known and more discussed, even when not read in its entirety.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness
Moderate: Antisemitism, Body shaming, Chronic illness, Death, Dementia, Domestic abuse, Grief, Medical content, Medical trauma, Misogyny, Murder, Panic attacks/disorders, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Violence, and Xenophobia