Revels in Madness offers a history of Western culture's shifting understandings of insanity as evidenced in its literature and as influenced by medical knowledge. The book traces the period from the development of Greek medicine, and of Greek tragedy and comedy, to contemporary representations of madness as shaped by modern psychiatry and psychoanalysis and as portrayed in literature. It surveys a remarkable range of writers, including Cervantes, Nerval, Rimbaud, Holderlin, Charcot, Freud, and Kraepelin." "This book will interest those intrigued by the relationship between culture, medicine, and literature, both in the history of medicine and literature and in literary depictions of cognitive disabilities. Students of comparative literature or the history of science, as well as doctors, therapists, and those interested in clinical psychology, will also benefit from reading this book.