In the Cathedral at Christ Church in Oxford, between the recumbent knight with the false nose and the tomb of Saint Frideswide, who eluded her too amorous suitor by hiding among pigs, stands the funerary monument of Robert Burton. Already, it will be noticed, I am giving more information than is strictly necessary. My excuse must be that it is a habit I have caught from Burton himself. A schoolboy, asked to produce a review, is said to have written: 'This book tells me more than I wish to know about this subject.' The story is usually told as if it counted against the schoolboy; it can, however, without too much straining, be turned against The Anatomy of Melancholy.

LRB 23 November 1989 | PDF Download