Includes bibliographical references.

Preliminary Material / Roy Porter and Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra -- Introduction: Cultures of Neurasthenia from Beard to the First World War / Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra -- Nervousness, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century Style: From Luxury to Labour / Roy Porter -- Varieties of Medical Experience: Doctors and Patients, Psyche and Soma in America / Tom Lutz -- Neurasthenia in Britain: An Overview / Mathew Thomson -- 'A Mob of Incoherent Symptoms'? Neurasthenia in British Medical Discourse, 1860-1920 / Chandak Sengoopta -- 'Uterine Mischief': W.S. Playfair and his Neurasthenic Patients / Hilary Marland -- Public Views of Neurasthenia: Britain, 1880-1930 / Michael Neve -- Neurasthenia in Wilhelmine Germany: Culture, Sexuality, and the Demands of Nature / Doris Kaufmann -- Electrified Nerves, Degenerated Bodies: Medical Discourses on Neurasthenia in Germany, circa 1880-1914 / Volker Roelcke -- The Neurasthenic Experience in Imperial Germany: Expeditions into Patient Records and Side-looks upon General History / Joachim Radkau -- The Public's View of Neurasthenia in Germany: Looking for a New Rhythm of Life / Heinz-Peter Schmiedebach -- Neurasthenia in the Netherlands / Joost Vijselaar -- Neurasthenia as Pandora's Box? 'Zenuwachtigheid' and Dutch Psychiatry around 1900 / Jessica Slijkhuis -- In Search of Dutch Neurasthenics from the 1880s to the early-1920s / Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra -- A Harmless Disease: Children and Neurasthenia in the Netherlands / Nelleke Bakker -- Neurasthenia and Manhood in fin-de-siècle France / Christopher E. Forth -- Claire, Lise, Jean, Nadia, and Gisèle: Preliminary Notes towards a Characterisation of Pierre Janet's Psychasthenia / Sonu Shamdasani -- List of Illustrations / Roy Porter and Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra -- Index / Roy Porter and Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra.

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Neurasthenia, meaning nerve weakness, was ‘invented’ in the United States as a disorder of modernity, caused by the fast pace of urban life. Soon after, from the early 1880s onwards, this modern disease crossed the Atlantic. Neurasthenia became much less ‘popular’ in Britain or the Netherlands than in Germany. Neurasthenia’s heyday continued into the first decade of the twentieth century. The label referred to conditions similar to those currently labelled as chronic fatigue syndrome. Why this rise and fall of neurasthenia, and why these differences in popularity? This book, which emerged out of an Anglo-Dutch-German conference held in June 2000, explores neurasthenia’s many-sided history from a comparative perspective.