The Final Months: A Study of the Lives of 134 Persons Who Committed Suicide

by Eli Robins

Book by Robins, Eli

Genres: Psychology, Mental Health

438 pages, Hardcover

First published September 24, 1981

Reviews

[Meaghan · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting study of all the suicides that took place in the St. Louis metro area between May 1956 and May 1957. Divided by diagnosis (primarily depression or alcoholism), the history of each person and the events leading up to their suicide is told in detailed and succinct accounts of a page or two each. Most of the suicides were middle-aged or older. I didn't see any minors at all, though I'm not sure whether there weren't any or whether they were just excluded from the study. There were a couple of murder-suicides. Most puzzling were the few that were completely inexplicable -- according to the stories, the suicides were not mentally or medically ill and weren't having problems in their lives before they suddenly decided to kill themselves.

Of course, since the study is thirty years old and the deaths in the study are more than half a century old, this study says as much about the field of psychiatry in the mid-20th century as it does about suicide. But for most of the stories included, I think these deaths could have happened to anyone, at any time. I do like the fact that the accounts pretty much speak for themselves -- not very much analysis is attempted as to "why" or "whose fault" it was that the person took their life.

I wish some more current version of this study existed. I found it very interesting, but wonder how it could be updated with modern psychiatric theory.

[Noran Miss Pumkin]

very pricy out of print book