Abstract
To the Editor.— A physician friend presented me with copy of Dr Andreasen's article, The Artist as Scientist: Psychiatric Diagnosis in Shakespeare's Tragedies (235:1868, 1976). While I have considerable doubt as to the relevance of Dr Andreasen's relation of modern psychiatry to Shakespearean psychology, I am much more concerned with the carelessness of her scholarship and surprised that such carelessness is acceptable inThe Journal. First, what are Dr Andreasen's sources for her assertions concerning Elizabethan drama and medicine? There are no footnotes and only the skimpiest bibliography. I am surprised to read thatThe Spanish Tragediewas the first Elizabethan play and more surprised yet to learn that this typical melodrama of courtly intrigue with its obligatory mad character is a play about insanity. Moreover, the only book on Shakespeare or Elizabethan drama cited in the bibliography is highly controversial work containing good deal of conjecture.
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