David's Box: The Journals and Letters of a Young Man Diagnosed as Schizophrenic 1960-1971

These edited journals of a highly intelligent young man document in painstaking detail what it was like to be diagnosed with schizophrenia in the 1960s - the dehumanising attitudes, the inept prescription of drugs, and other shortcomings of mental health services. "David" eventually manages to sustain an unskilled job and move into a bedsitter but is now faced with goading from his fellow workers and social isolation. Giving up the job he hates and faced with a return to living in a half-way house, he calmly tells us why he made his final decision.

The journals give an insight into the experience of madness that no textbook or retrospective account could supply. David was a fly on his own wall, attempting all along to make sense of his life, but barely succeeding. His perceptive observations inform us of the dilemmas that continue to challenge mental health professionals, and 'service users' today. For this reason, the authors have added a chapter on the changes to mental health services since 1970 and evaluate what progress has been made.