Ostensibly a guidebook to melancholia or depression, Burton's masterpiece is really an all-encompassing examination of the human condition.
Robert Burton (1577-1640) spent most of his life in Oxford, first
as a student and later as a scholar. His most famous work, the
enormous Anatomy of Melancholy, was first published in 1621 and
expanded in further editions throughout Burton's life.
Angus Gowland is a Reader in Intellectual History at University
College London.
The best book ever written
*Guardian*
The greatest work of prose of the greatest period of English
prose-writing
*Llewelyn Powys*
Burton's masterpiece. It is one of the finest prose works in
English . . . it is funny, a laugh-aloud book, one that seems to
convey the character of its writer with a rare clarity. It is an
ode to reading that overflows with allusions and quotations, making
it a book that feels, at times, as if it is about the whole of
human knowledge. In its wonderfully capacious digressiveness, it
pulsates with a life force that is, in itself, a charm against the
terrors, the fears and the loneliness of melancholy
*The Guardian*
This is the best popular edition ever produced of one of the most
amusing books in our language, a masterpiece of scholarship. It
belongs on the shelves of everyone who loves English literature and
all those who aspire to do so
*The Critic*
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