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My Experiences in a Lunatic Asylum - By a Sane Patient - The Original Classic Edition
My Experiences in a Lunatic Asylum - By A Sane Patient - The Original Classic Edition
30 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 1879
52 people are currently reading
149 people want to read
About the author
Herman Charles Merivale
51 books2 followersHerman Charles Merivale MA (27 January 1839 – 17 August 1906) was an English dramatist and poet, son of Herman Merivale. He also used the punning pseudonym Felix Dale.
A barrister, writer, and civil servant who was Permanent Under-Secretary of the India Office, he was educated at Harrow School and Balliol College, Oxford, where Algernon Charles Swinburne and Charles Bowen were his contemporaries. He graduated BA in 1861. At his father's home he met many distinguished men, including Lord Robert Cecil (afterwards Prime Minister Lord Salisbury), who became a lifelong friend. His friends in literary and dramatic circles included William Makepeace Thackeray, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Matthew Arnold, Anthony Trollope, W. S. Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan, Edmund Yates, Charles Dickens and others.
Following his father's death in 1874 he gave up the law in favour of literature and the theatre. Merivale wrote many farces and burlesques.[3] For John Hollingshead he produced a burlesque, The Lady of Lyons Married and Settled, performed at the Gaiety Theatre (5 October 1878), and Called There and Back (15 October 1884). The Butler (1886) and The Don (1888) were both written for the actor J. L. Toole. In writing The Don, and other works, Merivale was assisted by his wife, Elizabeth, the daughter of John Pittman, whom he married in London on 13 May 1878.[2]
Suffering from depression for many years, following a breakdown in 1879 he went to Australia on the advice of his physician, and then returned with his health recovered, only to discover that the power of attorney he had left with a defaulting solicitor had cost him his entire fortune.
A few years before his death Merivale became a Roman Catholic. He died suddenly of heart failure on 14 January 1906 at 69 Woodstock Road, Acton, Middlesex, and was buried in his father's grave in Brompton Cemetery. He had no children and his widow was granted a civil-list pension of £50 in 1906.
A barrister, writer, and civil servant who was Permanent Under-Secretary of the India Office, he was educated at Harrow School and Balliol College, Oxford, where Algernon Charles Swinburne and Charles Bowen were his contemporaries. He graduated BA in 1861. At his father's home he met many distinguished men, including Lord Robert Cecil (afterwards Prime Minister Lord Salisbury), who became a lifelong friend. His friends in literary and dramatic circles included William Makepeace Thackeray, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Matthew Arnold, Anthony Trollope, W. S. Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan, Edmund Yates, Charles Dickens and others.
Following his father's death in 1874 he gave up the law in favour of literature and the theatre. Merivale wrote many farces and burlesques.[3] For John Hollingshead he produced a burlesque, The Lady of Lyons Married and Settled, performed at the Gaiety Theatre (5 October 1878), and Called There and Back (15 October 1884). The Butler (1886) and The Don (1888) were both written for the actor J. L. Toole. In writing The Don, and other works, Merivale was assisted by his wife, Elizabeth, the daughter of John Pittman, whom he married in London on 13 May 1878.[2]
Suffering from depression for many years, following a breakdown in 1879 he went to Australia on the advice of his physician, and then returned with his health recovered, only to discover that the power of attorney he had left with a defaulting solicitor had cost him his entire fortune.
A few years before his death Merivale became a Roman Catholic. He died suddenly of heart failure on 14 January 1906 at 69 Woodstock Road, Acton, Middlesex, and was buried in his father's grave in Brompton Cemetery. He had no children and his widow was granted a civil-list pension of £50 in 1906.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 23, 2013
I found this fascinating. At the moment, I work for a Group Home and work with adults and adolescents with intellectual disabilities. It was interesting to me to wonder at how the people I work with would have been treated 130 years ago. The author spends a lot of time attacking over treatment, and how at the time it seemed as though anyone caught at the wrong moment could have been admitted to an asylum (the author himself was nothing more than an hypochondriac). The author suggested repeatedly that living in the asylum was enough to drive someone into insanity even if they were not before coming to the asylum. All in all, the book contained very interesting and insightful thoughts, experiences and views.
July 25, 2019
Good book.
To understand whats going on you have to realize a few major things.
First is that the author has crippling depression.
Second, in the victorian era it's not uncommon for someone to be sent into an asylum for anything, even just for having depression.
Third, it's the wild west of medicine, so from both the doctors and his own self-medication he has several episodes of just being unaware of where he is or a fogged memory. This is an era, that less than a decade after this book, invented coca cola, a drink that had cocaine in it, to sell as a pick me up over the counter. So God only knows all the stuff this guy took.
It's a very interesting story from a man broken by an absurd system trying to recount what happened to him in order to at least come to terms with it himself... if not maybe get people to start talking about reforming it.
To understand whats going on you have to realize a few major things.
First is that the author has crippling depression.
Second, in the victorian era it's not uncommon for someone to be sent into an asylum for anything, even just for having depression.
Third, it's the wild west of medicine, so from both the doctors and his own self-medication he has several episodes of just being unaware of where he is or a fogged memory. This is an era, that less than a decade after this book, invented coca cola, a drink that had cocaine in it, to sell as a pick me up over the counter. So God only knows all the stuff this guy took.
It's a very interesting story from a man broken by an absurd system trying to recount what happened to him in order to at least come to terms with it himself... if not maybe get people to start talking about reforming it.
January 16, 2013
This is an illuminating memoir by Herman Merivale relating, as the title suggests, his time in one of England's countryside asylums in the 1860's. Merivale's tale could be the inspiration for "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest": the main subject - in this case, the author - is less than justly sentenced to a facility for the mentally disturbed. Literally crazy caricatures abound, prisoner and jailer alike. Lofty psychology experts float in and out of Merivale's stay, some more respectable than others but on the whole clueless to patients' real needs. Nurses withhold or too bountifully dispense medications, and wardens rely on inhumane tactics to illicit compliance. As our writer states, this time in British history was "when imprisonment was a form of cruelty which [needed] a new name." He highlights the horrific, hopeless conditions faced by any man, woman or child with even a mild case of depression or of schizophrenia or, for perhaps the most unfortunate souls, of ill-meaning family paying hefty sums to have them committed.
While Merivale manages to pique my interest in the subject of wrongful confinement and 19th-Century malpractices, his style - certainly typical of Victorian literature - is rather dry and verbose. What message he could have delivered in a pithy pamphlet (which is, of course, that the mental institution system was vastly broken and needed to be recognized and addressed by the masses), he instead draws out to what I consider an uncomfortable length. In his defense, after being published Merivale confessed that his writing "My Experiences" was simply a "calm" narration of his "travels in dark lands" - I guess more catharsis than anything. I don't necessarily recommend running out to buy this book ASAP, but you might find it a satisfactory loan from your local library. Y'know, to stay sane on a lonely winter weekend.
(Below are the only other reviews I could find online of this book. My sentiments most closely align with the third reviewer.)
4/5 stars
"Merivale describes the state of Victorian policy and practice, of the Lunacy Law`s corruption of the individual`s rights to be judged by qualified Drs vs a persons relatives` ease in having a person being sentenced to private asylums, with wardens and Drs. who have no psychiatry knowledge, nor training, being private-for-profit. We have have come far in mental heath care reform; the closing in the 1970`s of the country's mental asylums in favor of outpatients clients treated at the local community clinics, which has greatly increased the homeless population with non-compliant-mental patients." -Heidi Kratzer
1/5 stars
"Rambling discourse with little details. Not an enjoyable or informative story. Lacks continuity of thought and does not adequately explain how he came to be committed." -Sherri
2/5 stars
"The title grabbed me as something of interest. After reading two chapters though, I was tempted to put it down in favor of a more accessible story. The language is rambling and dated, a struggle for anyone who is not familiar with 19th Century British English prose. There are few 'juicy bits' if you are hoping for a soap opera tell-all and little of historical value that a non-fiction work wouldn't provide. The narrative's saving grace is that it's not lengthy." - Zhydovyn18
While Merivale manages to pique my interest in the subject of wrongful confinement and 19th-Century malpractices, his style - certainly typical of Victorian literature - is rather dry and verbose. What message he could have delivered in a pithy pamphlet (which is, of course, that the mental institution system was vastly broken and needed to be recognized and addressed by the masses), he instead draws out to what I consider an uncomfortable length. In his defense, after being published Merivale confessed that his writing "My Experiences" was simply a "calm" narration of his "travels in dark lands" - I guess more catharsis than anything. I don't necessarily recommend running out to buy this book ASAP, but you might find it a satisfactory loan from your local library. Y'know, to stay sane on a lonely winter weekend.
(Below are the only other reviews I could find online of this book. My sentiments most closely align with the third reviewer.)
4/5 stars
"Merivale describes the state of Victorian policy and practice, of the Lunacy Law`s corruption of the individual`s rights to be judged by qualified Drs vs a persons relatives` ease in having a person being sentenced to private asylums, with wardens and Drs. who have no psychiatry knowledge, nor training, being private-for-profit. We have have come far in mental heath care reform; the closing in the 1970`s of the country's mental asylums in favor of outpatients clients treated at the local community clinics, which has greatly increased the homeless population with non-compliant-mental patients." -Heidi Kratzer
1/5 stars
"Rambling discourse with little details. Not an enjoyable or informative story. Lacks continuity of thought and does not adequately explain how he came to be committed." -Sherri
2/5 stars
"The title grabbed me as something of interest. After reading two chapters though, I was tempted to put it down in favor of a more accessible story. The language is rambling and dated, a struggle for anyone who is not familiar with 19th Century British English prose. There are few 'juicy bits' if you are hoping for a soap opera tell-all and little of historical value that a non-fiction work wouldn't provide. The narrative's saving grace is that it's not lengthy." - Zhydovyn18
December 13, 2013
This book rambled on at a breakneck pace, jumped back and forth, repeated statements over and over, and was delightfully full of literary references, Greek, and French quotes.
On one hand, I feel that the style of writing is purposeful; if I were to imagine a batty Victorian, this is, perhaps, what I would imagine. The concept was highly intriguing, as I have immediate family members who have mental illness, and can certainly relate to some of the manners of speech and observances the character has. However, the problem is that the form is extremely overdone, making it difficult to read through and, I would suppose, highly inaccessible for any but the most patient and diligent of readers.
As a side note, this book reminded me of Cloud Atlas's Timothy Cavendish.
On one hand, I feel that the style of writing is purposeful; if I were to imagine a batty Victorian, this is, perhaps, what I would imagine. The concept was highly intriguing, as I have immediate family members who have mental illness, and can certainly relate to some of the manners of speech and observances the character has. However, the problem is that the form is extremely overdone, making it difficult to read through and, I would suppose, highly inaccessible for any but the most patient and diligent of readers.
As a side note, this book reminded me of Cloud Atlas's Timothy Cavendish.
June 20, 2015
At times, this story rambles however, it is quite thought provoking.
March 26, 2024
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February 4, 2019What it was like to be locked away in an asylum by a Victorian barrister. He claimed his friends put him away and it was hell, as he regarded himself as sane. I'm not too sure. Most of it is about how sane he was and how bad it was inside there. It still seemed better than today's public mental hospitals in many ways. Still, a good insight into a Victorian private lunatic asylum, if you can get past the Latin phrases and contemporary language. Vivid descriptions of the characters inside with him.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews