Tag: Melancholy
-
Clausewitz’s death: Cholera and melancholy
Nicolas Roberto RoblesBadajoz, Spain “Sollte mich ein früher Tod in dieser Arbeit unterbrechen”(“If an early death should terminate my work”)— Carl von Clausewitz, Vom Kriege Carl Philipp Gottfried von Clausewitz (1780–1831) was a Prussian general and military theorist who stressed the psychological and political aspects of waging war. He is remembered chiefly for his work…
-
Dancing with spiders: Tarantellas and tarantism
Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “There are always hysterical people undergoing extraordinary cures.”– Robertson Davies, The Cunning Man The industrial city of Taranto is in the “heel” of boot-shaped Italy. The Romans called the city Tarentum,1 and part of its historical importance comes from its name. Confusion has also arisen from that name’s overuse. A traditional folk…
-
Samuel Johnson: “The great convulsionary”
JMS PearceHull, England, United Kingdom This paper reproduces in an abridged form an earlier article by its author1 appraising the evidence that Samuel Johnson suffered from Tourette’s syndrome. Several authors have commented on the many eccentricities of Dr. Samuel Johnson (Fig 1).2 Thomas Tyers, for example, has written as follows: His gestures, which were a…
-
Musical evenings on HMS Bounty
Stewart JustmanMissoula, Montana, United States Dispatched to Tahiti in 1787 to gather breadfruit trees to be transplanted to the West Indies, HMS Bounty was a small ship with every possible inch allotted to botanical cargo. Spare too was the crew, which included no marines who might have acted as Lieutenant William Bligh’s bodyguards in the…
-
The derailment of Franklin Pierce
Jacob Appel New York, New York, United States Few subjects have attracted as much attention from medical historians, both well-founded and speculative, as the health of United States presidents. Considerable debate exists over the extent of impairment caused by Lincoln’s bouts of melancholia,1 Grant’s alcoholism,2 Wilson’s stroke,3 and Coolidge’s depression4—to name only those chief executives from…
-
Book review: John Keats’ Medical Notebook
Arpan K. BanerjeeSolihull, United Kingdom February 23, 2021 marked the bicentenary of the death of the great Romantic poet John Keats. Born in 1795, Keats lived a tragically short life, dying at the age of only twenty-five. It is perhaps little known that he first qualified as an apothecary doctor before giving up medicine for…
-
Sergei Rachmaninoff: The dichotomy of life and music
Michael YafiChaden YafiHouston, Texas, United States Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943), a Russian composer, was known for having very large hands. With a span that covered twelve white keys on the keyboard (the interval of a thirteenth), he could play a left-hand chord of C, E flat, G, C, and G.1 This has led some medical experts…
-
Scurvy before James Lind
JMS PearceHull, England, United Kingdom Cures of disease are still relatively uncommon. Scurvy is an example of a disease well recognized but whose cause eluded doctors for centuries until an empirical curative remedy and later a specific cause were discovered. In more recent times Koch’s discovery of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in phthisis or consumption in 1882,…