Cultural Constructions of Madness in Eighteenth-Century Writing Representing the Insane

by Ingram, Allan; Faubert, Michelle

• ISBN13: 9781403945952
• ISBN10: 1403945950
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-03-02
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

This work deals with the (mis)representation of insanity through a substantial range of literary forms and figures from across the eighteenth century and beyond. Chapters cover the representation, distortion, sentimentalization and elevation of insanity, and such associated issues as gender, personal identity, and performance, in some of the best and least known writers of the period. A selection of visual material, including works by Hogarth, Rowlandson, and Gillray, is also discussed. While primarily adopting a literary focus, the work is informed throughout by an alertness to significant issues of medical and psychiatric history.

Author Biography

Allan Ingram is Professor of English at the University of Northumbria, UK.

Michelle Faubert holds a doctorate in Romantic Madness from the University of Toronto, Canada.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	viii
Acknowledgements	x
1 Speaking It Like a Horse: Gulliver's Travels and the Contexts of Insanity	1	(24)
2 Reconstructing the Classical Model: Pope's Homer and Its Influence	25	(28)
3 'Th' unbalanc'd Mind': Poetry, Satire and the Assimilation of Madness	53	(25)
4 'The Madness of a Multitude': Insanity, People and Prose	78	(28)
5 Acting the Part of a Madman: Insanity and the Stage	106	(30)
6 A Gendered Affliction: Women, Writing, Madness	136	(34)
7 'The Image of Our Mind': Seeing and Being Seen	170	(32)
8 Madness Itself: the Real Story	202	(29)
Bibliography	231	(9)
Index	240
Note: Chapter 6 is by Michelle Faubert.