Victorian literature is rife with scenes of madness, with mental disorder functioning as everything from a simple plot device to a commentary on the foundations of Victorian society. But while madness in Victorian fiction has been much studied, most scholarship has focused on the portrayal of madness in women; male mental disorder in the period has suffered comparative neglect. Valerie Pedlar corrects this imbalance in "The Most Dreadful Visitation,"
This extraordinary study explores a wide range of Victorian writings to consider the relationship between the portrayal of mental illness in...