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The Anatomy of Melancholy
A 1621 scholar wrote 1,000+ pages about sadness to cheer himself up. His conclusion: 'Be not solitary, be not idle.' 📚
Who it's for
Burton's book is a huge, digressive, often funny attempt to gather everything known about melancholy, written by a man who says he wrote it to keep himself busy and away from his own.
Feelings it meets
What it is
Robert Burton's 1621 treatise, published under the pseudonym Democritus Junior, attempts to gather knowledge about melancholy into three partitions covering its causes, its cures, and love-melancholy and religious melancholy. Although framed as a medical work, it ranges widely across history, astronomy, geography and literature, often with humor.
Where to find it
Public domain in the US; free on Project Gutenberg. NYRB Classics edition in print and in libraries.
Before you start
Heads up: Discussion of suicide.
Age: Ages 16+
The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet, “On Joy and Sorrow”
