To all of the other excellent suggestions given by other TIPSters, I'd like to add a very interesting book I got a few years ago, at the suggestion of (I think!) Allen Esterson. It's a psychiatric and photographic history (translated from the French) of patients from "the notorious Parisian asylum for insane and incurable women" in Paris, Salpétrière at the turn of the century, called *Invention of Hysteria: Charcot and the Photographic Iconography of the Salpétrière.*
http://books.google.com/books?id=4DDpLqv_puEC&dq=invention+of+hysteria+charcot&source=gbs_navlinks_s Jean-Martin Charcot induced many of the 5,000 patients at the Salpétrière to "perform" their own hysterias so he could show the photographs (and sometimes actual demonstrations) at his "Tuesday Lectures." The photographs, most of which are quite alarming and sad, are accompanied by very detailed discussion of the patients, the process of photographing them, their disorders and how they could be induced, as well as an inside look at what a psychiatric hospital was like at the end of the 19th century. That old, vague diagnosis of "hysteria" really comes to life in this collection of photographs and stories. Beth Benoit Granite State College Plymouth State University New Hampshire --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly (bsouthe...@frostburg.edu)
