Melancholia in Anton Chekhov's "A Boring Story": A Physician Treating Himself
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15273/dmj.Vol26No1.4426Abstract
In this article, the subject of melancholia is explored in relation to Anton Chekhov‘s short story, “A Boring Story.” This story raises the question of whether the protagonist's melancholic changes in his feelings and thoughts are the result of an underlying organic illness or of new insight into the nature of his existence. The purpose of this article is to examine the implications of this question in their historical context. In terms of the history of psychiatry, the late nineteenth-century disease neurasthenia and some of its causes are discussed. In a broader examination of the history of ideas, the development of psychiatric thought is discussed in relation to the dualisms between mind and body, subject and object, and illness and disease.
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