A Visionary Madness

A Visionary Madness PDF Author: Mike Jay
Publisher: North Atlantic Books
ISBN: 1583947175
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
Confined in Bedlam in 1797 as an incurable lunatic, James Tilly Matthews is one of the most bizarre case studies in the annals of psychiatry. Often cited as the first thorough case study of what we would today call paranoid schizophrenia, Matthews drew intricate diagrams of the "influencing machine" that he believed to be reading and controlling his mind. But his case was even stranger than his doctors realized: many of the incredible conspiracies in which he claimed to be involved were entirely real. A Visionary Madness traces the story of antiwar advocate James Tilly Matthews through the political and social upheaval of the late eighteenth century, providing a vivid account of the unraveling of Matthews's mind, a snapshot of late eighteenth-century psychiatry, and its relevance to current narratives of madness, conspiracy theories, mind control, and political manipulation. Digging deep into historical records and primary sources, author Mike Jay carefully untangles truth from delusion, providing evidence that Matthews was a political prisoner as much as a madman: he had been working as a double agent in the French Revolution and was privy to political secrets the British government feared he might expose. In the process, Jay illuminates the murky revolutionary politics of the 1790s and situates Matthews' visionary madness within the wider cultural upheavals of a world on the brink of modernity. The details of Matthews' treatment in Bedlam reveals the birth-pangs of early psychiatry and its struggle to free its patients from the harsh regimes of the eighteenth-century madhouse. A fascinating and fast-paced narrative history, A Visionary Madness raises profound questions about the nature of madness and the birth of the modern world.

A Visionary Madness

A Visionary Madness PDF Author: Mike Jay
Publisher: North Atlantic Books
ISBN: 1583947175
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 289

Get Book Here

Book Description
Confined in Bedlam in 1797 as an incurable lunatic, James Tilly Matthews is one of the most bizarre case studies in the annals of psychiatry. Often cited as the first thorough case study of what we would today call paranoid schizophrenia, Matthews drew intricate diagrams of the "influencing machine" that he believed to be reading and controlling his mind. But his case was even stranger than his doctors realized: many of the incredible conspiracies in which he claimed to be involved were entirely real. A Visionary Madness traces the story of antiwar advocate James Tilly Matthews through the political and social upheaval of the late eighteenth century, providing a vivid account of the unraveling of Matthews's mind, a snapshot of late eighteenth-century psychiatry, and its relevance to current narratives of madness, conspiracy theories, mind control, and political manipulation. Digging deep into historical records and primary sources, author Mike Jay carefully untangles truth from delusion, providing evidence that Matthews was a political prisoner as much as a madman: he had been working as a double agent in the French Revolution and was privy to political secrets the British government feared he might expose. In the process, Jay illuminates the murky revolutionary politics of the 1790s and situates Matthews' visionary madness within the wider cultural upheavals of a world on the brink of modernity. The details of Matthews' treatment in Bedlam reveals the birth-pangs of early psychiatry and its struggle to free its patients from the harsh regimes of the eighteenth-century madhouse. A fascinating and fast-paced narrative history, A Visionary Madness raises profound questions about the nature of madness and the birth of the modern world.

Rush

Rush PDF Author: Stephen Fried
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0804140073
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 608

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Book Description
The monumental life of Benjamin Rush, medical pioneer and one of our most provocative and unsung Founding Fathers FINALIST FOR THE GEORGE WASHINGTON BOOK PRIZE • AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR By the time he was thirty, Dr. Benjamin Rush had signed the Declaration of Independence, edited Common Sense, toured Europe as Benjamin Franklin’s protégé, and become John Adams’s confidant, and was soon to be appointed Washington’s surgeon general. And as with the greatest Revolutionary minds, Rush was only just beginning his role in 1776 in the American experiment. As the new republic coalesced, he became a visionary writer and reformer; a medical pioneer whose insights and reforms revolutionized the treatment of mental illness; an opponent of slavery and prejudice by race, religion, or gender; an adviser to, and often the physician of, America’s first leaders; and “the American Hippocrates.” Rush reveals his singular life and towering legacy, installing him in the pantheon of our wisest and boldest Founding Fathers. Praise for Rush “Entertaining . . . Benjamin Rush has been undeservedly forgotten. In medicine . . . [and] as a political thinker, he was brilliant.”—The New Yorker “Superb . . . reminds us eloquently, abundantly, what a brilliant, original man Benjamin Rush was, and how his contributions to . . . the United States continue to bless us all.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer “Perceptive . . . [a] readable reassessment of Rush’s remarkable career.”—The Wall Street Journal “An amazing life and a fascinating book.”—CBS This Morning “Fried makes the case, in this comprehensive and fascinating biography, that renaissance man Benjamin Rush merits more attention. . . . Fried portrays Rush as a complex, flawed person and not just a list of accomplishments; . . . a testament to the authorial thoroughness and insight that will keep readers engaged until the last page.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review) “[An] extraordinary and underappreciated man is reinstated to his rightful place in the canon of civilizational advancement in Rush. . . . Had I read Fried’s Rush before the year’s end, it would have crowned my favorite books of 2018 . . . [a] superb biography.”—Brain Pickings

Visionary Madness

Visionary Madness PDF Author: Jeffrey Allen Goldstein
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Hermeneutics
Languages : en
Pages : 1042

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Book Description


The Air Loom Gang

The Air Loom Gang PDF Author: Mike Jay
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
"The Air Loom Gang" recounts the remarkable true story of Matthews: a peace activist caught up in the Napoleonic wars between England and France who becomes convinced of an elaborate conspiracy aimed at the very heart of power.

The Spiritual Gift of Madness

The Spiritual Gift of Madness PDF Author: Seth Farber
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1594777039
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 439

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Book Description
A bold call for the “insane” to reclaim their rightful role as prophets of spiritual and cultural transformation • Explains how many of those diagnosed as schizophrenic, bipolar, and other forms of “madness” are not ill but experiencing a spiritual awakening • Explores the rise of Mad Pride and the mental patients’ liberation movement • Reveals how those seen as “mad” must embrace their spiritual gifts to help the coming global spiritual transition Many of the great prophets of the past experienced madness--a breakdown followed by a breakthrough, spiritual death followed by rebirth. With the advent of modern psychiatry, the budding prophets of today are captured and transformed into chronic mental patients before they can flower into the visionaries and mystics they were intended to become. As we approach the tipping point between extinction and global spiritual awakening, there is a deep need for these prophets to embrace their spiritual gifts. To make this happen, we must learn to respect the sanctity of madness. We need to cultivate Mad Pride. Exploring the rise of Mad Pride and the mental patients’ liberation movement as well as building upon psychiatrist R. D. Laing’s revolutionary theories, Seth Farber, Ph.D., explains that diagnosing people as mad has more to do with social control than therapy. Many of those labeled as schizophrenic, bipolar, and other kinds of “mad” are not ill but simply experiencing different forms of spiritual awakening: they are seeing and feeling what is wrong with society and what needs to be done to change it. Farber shares his interviews with former schizophrenics who now lead successful and inspiring lives. He shows that it is impossible for society to change as long as the mad are suppressed because they are our catalysts of social change. By reclaiming their rightful role as prophets of spiritual and cultural revitalization, the mad--by seeding new visions for our future--can help humanity overcome the spiritual crisis that endangers our survival and lead us to a higher and long-awaited stage of spiritual development.

Illustrations of Madness (Psychology Revivals)

Illustrations of Madness (Psychology Revivals) PDF Author: John Haslam
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134665164
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
John Haslam’s Illustrations of Madness, written in 1810, occupies a special place in psychiatric history, it was the first book-length account of one single psychiatric case written by a British psychiatrist. John Haslam, apothecary to London’s Bethlem Hospital, and a leading psychiatrist of the early-nineteenth century, details the case of James Tilly Matthews, who had been a patient in the hospital for some ten years. Matthews claimed he was sane, as did his friends and certain doctors. Haslam, on behalf of the Bethlem authorities, contended he was insane, and attempted to demonstrate this by presenting a detailed account of Matthew’s own delusional system, as far as possible in Matthew’s own words. Originally published in 1988 as part of the Tavistock Classics in the History of Psychiatry series, Roy Porter’s Introduction to this facsimile reprint of an historic book goes beyond Haslam’s text to reveal the extraordinary psychiatric politics surrounding Matthew’s confinement and the court case it produced, leading up to Haslam’s dismissal from his post. Still relevant today, Haslam’s account can be used as material upon which to base a modern diagnosis of Matthew’s disorder.

Madness and Blake's Myth

Madness and Blake's Myth PDF Author: Paul Youngquist
Publisher: Penn State Press
ISBN: 0271039612
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 213

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Book Description


The Road to Madness

The Road to Madness PDF Author: H.P. Lovecraft
Publisher: Del Rey
ISBN: 030780769X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 565

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Book Description
One of the most influential practitioners of American horror, H.P. Lovecraft inspired the work of Stephen King, Anne Rice, and Clive Barker. As he perfected his mastery of the macabre, his works developed from seminal fragments into acknowledged masterpieces of terror. This volume traces his chilling career and includes: IMPRISONED WITH THE PHARAOHS--Houdini seeks to reveal the demons that inhabit the Egyptian night. AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS--An unsuspecting expedition uncovers a city of untold terror, buried beneath an Antarctic wasteland. Plus, for the first time in any Del Rey edition: HERBERT WEST: REANIMATOR--Mad experiments yield hideous results in this, the inspiration for the cult film Re-Animator. COOL AIR--An icy apartment hides secrets no man dares unlock. THE TERRIBLE OLD MAN--The intruders seek a fortune but find only death! AND TWENTY-FOUR MORE BLOOD-CHILLING TALES

A Dreamer and a Visionary

A Dreamer and a Visionary PDF Author: S. T. Joshi
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0853239460
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 431

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Book Description
"H. P. Lovecraft has come to be recognised as the leading author of supernatural fiction in the twentieth century. But how did a man who died in poverty, with no book of his stories published in his lifetime, become such an icon in horror literature? S. T. Joshi, the leading authority on Lovecraft, has traced in detail the course of Lovecraft's life, spent largely in Providence, Rhode Island, and has shown how Lovecraft was engaged in the political, economic, social, and intellectual currents of his time, and how his developing thought informed his fiction and other writings. Lovecraft's reaction to World War I, the Jazz Age, and the Depression, as well as to literary modernism and scientific advance, markedly affected his thought and work, so that by the end of his life he had become both a 'mechanistic materialist' and a 'cosmic regionalist' who looked to his New England heritage as a bulwark against the meaninglessness of a godless cosmos. It was the wonder and terror of that cosmos that Lovecraft depicted, with poetic grandeur, in his work." --Book Jacket.

The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature

The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature PDF Author: Richard Bradford
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119652642
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 912

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Book Description
THE WILEY BLACKWELL COMPANION TO CONTEMPORARY BRITISH AND IRISH LITERATURE An insightful guide to the exploration of modern British and Irish literature The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature is a must-have guide for anyone hoping to navigate the world of new British and Irish writing. Including modern authors and poets from the 1960s through to the 21st century, the Companion provides a thorough overview of contemporary poetry, fiction, and drama by some of the most prominent and noteworthy writers. Seventy-three comprehensive chapters focus on individual authors as well as such topics as Englishness and identity, contemporary Science Fiction, Black writing in Britain, crime fiction, and the influence of globalization on British and Irish Literature. Written in four parts, The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature includes comprehensive examinations of individual authors, as well as a variety of themes that have come to define the contemporary period: ethnicity, gender, nationality, and more. A thorough guide to the main figures and concepts in contemporary literature from Britain and Ireland, this two-volume set: Includes studies of notable figures such as Seamus Heaney and Angela Carter, as well as more recently influential writers such as Zadie Smith and Sarah Waters. Covers topics such as LGBT fiction, androgyny in contemporary British Literature, and post-Troubles Northern Irish Fiction Features a broad range of writers and topics covered by distinguished academics Includes an analysis of the interplay between individual authors and the major themes of the day, and whether an examination of the latter enables us to appreciate the former. The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary British and Irish Literature provides essential reading for students as well as academics seeking to learn more about the history and future direction of contemporary British and Irish Literature.