Mad, Bad And Sad

Mad, bad and sad. From the depression suffered by Virginia Woolf and Sylvia Plath to the mental anguish and addictions of iconic beauties Zelda Fitzgerald and Marilyn Monroe. From Freud and Jung and the radical breakthroughs of psychoanalysis to Lacan's construction of a modern movement and the new women-centred therapies. This is the story of how we have understood mental disorders and extreme states of mind in women over the last two hundred years and how we conceive of them today, when more and more of our inner life and emotions have become a matter for medics and therapists.

Winner of Medical Journalists' Association Open Book Awards 2009 (UK)
Short-listed for Duff Cooper 2009 (UK)
Short-listed for Warwick Prize for Writing 2009 (UK)
Short-listed for Mind Book of the Year Award 2009 (UK)
Long-listed for Samuel Johnson Prize 2008 (UK)

“** 'Subtle, textured and enthralling . . . One of the great strengths of this book is the way in which it charts the uncanny relationship between fashions in psychiatric theory and sufferer s' symptoms”

A tantalising mix of polemic and history, of ideology and fact . . . A gripping read . . . In a league far above any other book of its kind on this topic - SUNDAY BUSINESS POST

Subtle, textured and enthralling . . . One of the great strengths of this book is the way in which it charts the uncanny relationship between fashions in psychiatric theory and sufferers' symptoms - SUNDAY TIMES

Marvellous. At last! A serious, well-researched book on this important subject - Pamela Stephenson

The triumph of MAD, BAD AND SAD is to mix evocative case studies with potted histories of the great and good of psychology and psychiatry . . . an intelligent and academically rigorous - OBSERVER

Lisa Appignanesi was born in Poland. A novelist and writer, she is a former Deputy Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, is Chair of the Freud Museum, and President of English PEN.

Mad, bad and sad. From the depression suffered by Virginia Woolf and Sylvia Plath to the mental anguish and addictions of iconic beauties Zelda Fitzgerald and Marilyn Monroe. From Freud and Jung and the radical breakthroughs of psychoanalysis to Lacan's construction of a modern movement and the new women-centred therapies. This is the story of how we have understood mental disorders and extreme states of mind in women over the last two hundred years and how we conceive of them today, when more and more of our inner life and emotions have become a matter for medics and therapists.

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