Eighteenth and nineteenth century English coroners’ inquests investigated roughly one death in every twenty. Their main task was to discover if someone else might have been involved or if a… Read more »
These nine examples of letters, diaries, and notes build up to what I think is a compelling picture of the despair and powerlessness felt by suicides. Some were left by… Read more »
This is the first of three podcasts that give different accounts of suicide. We first came across William Cowper a few weeks back, having an anxiety attack that left him… Read more »
This week’s podcast explores the case of Hugh Blair, one of the clearest and earliest cases of autism for modern psychologists. In this blog post, Rab reflects on the launch… Read more »
Last week’s extract was a series of diary entries showing how a clergyman sought to help a young woman with learning disabilities. Hearing the voice of the intellectually impaired can… Read more »
People with learning disabilities were often slow to acquire the ability to read and write – which were not normal skills for many people until the 19th century. We know… Read more »
This week’s podcast is the final episode of four based on one detailed extract. You can find the extract here or you can listen to a voice extract on our soundcloud stream using… Read more »
This week’s podcast is the third of four episodes based on one detailed extract. You can find the extract here or you can listen to a voice extract on our soundcloud stream using… Read more »
This week’s podcast is the second of four episodes based on one detailed extract. You can find the extract here or you can listen to a voice extract on our soundcloud stream… Read more »
This week’s podcast is the first of four episodes based on one detailed extract. You can find the extract here or you can listen to a voice extract on our soundcloud stream… Read more »
Like many of those who had the time to write about their mental state prior to modern times, William Cowper came from a privileged background. Early in the reign of… Read more »
Both Fitzherbert and Allen, whose accounts formed the basis of earlier podcasts in this series, saw their mental condition as a burden to themselves and others. During the Renaissance in… Read more »
Alexander Cruden, the author of last week’s document, wholly disowned the label of madness. Dionys Fitzherbert also refused to be called insane, arguing in a lengthy account that she was… Read more »
Hannah Allen, the author of last week’s document, knew she suffered from melancholy. In the podcast this week we look at an altogether less sympathetic figure, Alexander Cruden. Cruden vigorously… Read more »
This week we hear the account of a young woman in 17th century London. Hannah Allen suffered from severe depression or what was then known as melancholy. She wrote about… Read more »
Rab Houston tallks about his recent interview with The Lancet Psychiatry Early in the afternoon of Tuesday 27 June 2017 I had a visit from a tall dark stranger at… Read more »
We begin our exploration of the voices of the mad with the story of the Rev. George Trosse, an English nonconformist minister, who wrote about his experience of mental illness… Read more »
You might recognise my voice from listening to some or all of my previous set of 44 podcasts about the history of psychiatry in Britain since 1500. That series was… Read more »
In this special podcast, Professor Rab Houston discusses some of the interesting questions that you have raised by listeners during the first series. He explains how he undertakes his research… Read more »
The first episode in our new podcast series – The Voice of the Mad – will be broadcast on Tuesday June 27th. This second series, which comprises 26 podcasts, uses… Read more »