The Psychiatrist (Masterplots II: Short Story Series, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis
- First Published: 1881
- Type of Plot: Satire
- Time of Work: The early nineteenth century
- Setting: Itaguai, a town near Rio de Janeiro
- Principal Characters: Dr. Simao Bacamarte, Dona Evarista Da Costa E Mascarenhas, Crispim Soares, Father Lopes, Porfirio Caetano Das Neves (Stewed Corn)
- Genres: Short fiction, Satire
- Subjects: Science or scientists, Mental illness, Barbershops or barbers, Psychiatry or psychiatrists, Research
- Locales: Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
The Story
According to the town chronicles, Simao Bacamarte, one of the greatest doctors in Europe, turned down two extremely prestigious crown appointments to return to his native Itaguai and devote his life to science. He settled there and married Dona Evarista, the story goes, not for love, but because she seemed to him a biologically promising specimen to mother his children.
When the children fail to come, Bacamarte dedicates himself to an exhaustive study of sterility. Realizing the therapeutic value of study itself, he hits on psychopathology, a then-unknown...
[The entire page is 1186 words long]
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