Off the Deep End: A History of Madness at Sea
Sign in to keep track of books you’ve read and want to read.
In the eighteenth century, the Royal Navy's own physician found that sailors were seven times more likely to suffer from severe mental illness than the general population.
Read more
On the high seas, beyond the rule of law, away from any sight of land for weeks at a time—often living in overcrowded and confined spaces, where anything that goes wrong could be fatal—the incredible pressures on sailors were immense. The ever-present fear drove some men to faith in God and superstition—and drove others mad.
Off the Deep End is the first detailed study of the effect on sanity that the vast, lonely, and powerful sea has always had on sailors. Eminently readable, Off the Deep End explores accounts that span the centuries, from desperate shipwreck stories and cannibalism in the Age of Sail to inexplicable multiple murders, to Donald Crowhurst's suicide in the middle of the 1968 solo Golden Globe Race, leaving behind two rambling notebooks of mounting neurosis and paranoia.
Of interest to readers of maritime history, psychology, sociology, and behavioral science, as well as sailors of all constitutions, this unique and fascinating book offers insight and analysis—a thoroughly absorbing read about the effects of the cruel sea on the human mind.
Liked Off the Deep End: A History of Madness at Sea? Here’s where I’d start.
These suit anyone who liked Off the Deep End: A History of Madness at Sea. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.
“If you want more of the same (psychology about nature), start with these.”
-
Our Dark Side: A History of Perversion
-
The Assault on Truth: Freud's Suppression of the Seduction Theory
-
Where the Roots Reach for Water: A Personal and Natural History of Melancholia
-
Black Rage: Two Black Psychiatrists Reveal the Full Dimensions of the Inner Conflicts and the Desperation of Black Life in the United States
“Readers describe these the same way.”
“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”
-
Seafaring Women: Adventures of Pirate Queens, Female Stowaways & Sailors' Wives
-
Outlaws of the Atlantic: Sailors, Pirates, and Motley Crews in the Age of Sail
-
Compass: A Story of Exploration and Innovation
-
Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: Merchant Seamen, Pirates and the Anglo-American Maritime World, 1700-1750