Literature, art and medical knowledge in Almas y cerebros by Enrique Gómez Carrillo

Abstract

The relations between literature and medicine constitute one of the central themes in the literature of the late nineteenth century. In this paper I present the issue through two texts by Enrique Gómez Carrillo, published in Almas y cerebros: the story “Psicopatía” and the treatise “Notas sobre las enfermedades de la sensación desde el punto de vista de la literatura”. In the first part I describe the importance of psychiatry and the placement of literature in the field of disease. In the second and third parts, I compare Gómez Carrillo’s treatise with Psycopathia sexualis, a book by Richard von Krafft-Ebing on which the writer is based. In the last part, I draw some conclusions regarding the relationship between literature and the invention of psychoanalysis.