The Anatomy of Melancholy

About this book

Under the pen name Democritus Junior, Robert Burton sets out to analyse every kind of melancholy, its causes, symptoms and cures, from bad diet, idleness, solitude, too much study and love to religious despair. Quoting hundreds of classical, medieval and modern authors, he wanders through medicine, philosophy, theology, astrology and anecdote, with digressions on the air, on spirits and on an ideal commonwealth, in one of the strangest and richest books in English.

Context and significance

Burton (1577–1640), a scholar of Christ Church, Oxford, who suffered from melancholy himself, first published the book in 1621 and kept enlarging it for the rest of his life. Samuel Johnson said it was the only book that ever took him out of bed two hours sooner than he wished to rise. Compare Browne's Religio Medici.

About the author