“Strange Letters to the Queen”: Mental and Emotional Distress in the Elizabethan State Papers
This paper uses a collection of highly unusual letters from the Elizabethan State Papers, whose authors are described as ‘crazy’, ‘distracted’, and ‘insane’, to explore the epistolary construction and expression of mental and emotional distress in late-sixteenth-century England. It begins by reflecting briefly on the tricky methodological problems inherent in such an enterprise: the uncertain…
