http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/319/7208/520/b British Medical Journal 1999;319:520 (21 August) Letters Shakespeare knew the layered clothing sign of schizophrenia [...] Few unambiguous descriptions of schizophrenia before 1800 exist, although some people argue that the disease has been known for many thousands of years. Bark has proposed that in Shakespeare's King Lear, Edgar, in his guise as Poor Tom, had chronic schizophrenia. [...] "Edgar: Poor Tom, that eats the swimming frog, the toad, the tadpole, the wallnewt, and the water; that in the fury of his heart, when the foul fiend rages, eats cow dung for sallets, swallows the old rat and the ditch-dog; drinks the green mantle of the standing pool; who is whipped from tithing to tithing, and stock-punish'd, and imprisoned; who hath had three suits to his back and six shirts to his body"... As with so many other aspects of medicine and human relations, the Bard's description of the wearing of layered clothing by schizophrenic patients is correct, insightful, and most poetic. Eric Altschuler, research fellow. Brain and Perception Laboratory, University of California, San Diego
