For Those Who Like Reading about the Writing of the Insane

On the Writing of the Insane was originally published in 1870. At the time, author George Mackenzie Bacon was a medical superintendent at Cambridgeshire County Asylum (now Fulbourn Hospital) near Cambridge, England. After witnessing the idiosyncrasies of his patients’ handwriting, he decided to capture his observations and several samples into a book—which is now available once again courtesy of Curious Publications.

Bacon is also the author of On primary cancer of the brain: an inquiry into its pathology, with statistics as to its frequency, and illustrative cases (1865), written while serving as an assistant physician at the asylum. Brain cancer first drew his attention, as he stated in the book’s preface, after unexpectedly discovering a malignant tumor “while examining the brain of a lunatic.” 

In September 1870, the London Practitioner shared a report from Bacon in which he discussed treating an “epileptic lad in whom I had reason to think the fits were mainly due to sexual excitement” by removing his testicles. These were certainly different times.

“He has considerably improved in intelligence, and is able to make himself useful in simple work,” Bacon noted. “He has ceased to masturbate, and seems to have no sexual inclination, but there is no apparent effeminacy of character.”

Following the text of On the Writing of the Insane, this Curious Publications edition includes Bacon’s annual Report of the Medical Supervisor from 1880, featuring tales of trepanation, hydrocephaly, and more.