Lockdown lessons from the history of solitude
Thursday, April 9, 2020 - 09:40
in Health & Medicine
When the poet John Donne was struck down by a sudden infection in 1623 he immediately found himself alone—even his doctors deserted him. The experience, which only lasted a week, was intolerable. He later wrote: "As sickness is the greatest misery, so the greatest misery of sickness is solitude."