Empire of Depression: A New History

Depression has taken over the world. Even 150 years ago, the word “depression” described only a pessimistic mood. However, in the mid-20th century, as European empires were collapsing, new Western clinical models and methods of mental health treatment spread worldwide. Today, the diagnosis “Depression” is given to every 25th resident of our planet. By revealing the continuity of human suffering throughout history, psychiatrist Jonathan Sadovsky shows how different cultures described intense inner pain—and how they tried to ease it. A range of treatments, both ancient and modern, truly reduces suffering, but full cure is still out of reach. In this book, the author attempts to bring together the most important information about depression and isolate key phenomena that will help us understand the scale of the epidemic and propose possible paths to defeating it.