In 1621, the English scholar Robert Burton published The Anatomy of Melancholy. It was the first attempt in the modern western world to understand and categorise causes, symptoms and treatments of that universal human experience: melancholy

In this episode, writer Amy Liptrot looks at the latest research into the links between inflammation and depression, and finding connections with Burton’s identification of an ‘inflamed brain’ as a cause.

She meets Professor Edward Bullmore, Head of Psychiatry at Cambridge University, and author of The Inflamed Mind: A Radical New Approach to Depression to find out how the immune system and responses to stress may be causes of some kinds of depression and how this could offer new treatment targets.

Amy’s explorations take her to Rydal Waters in The Lake District where she joins kindred spirit and wild swimming guide Suzanna Cruickshank for a bracing swim and where they share their experiences of cold water swimming and the benefits it has brought them both.

Swimming is a cure that Burton uncovers and adds to his Anatomy of Melancholy: ‘Cadan alone commends bathing in fresh rivers, and cold water, and adviseth all such as mean to live long to use it, for it agrees with all ages and complexion and is most profitable for hot temperatures.’

Is there any chance this could link with inflammation and our responses to stress?

Dr Mike Tipton, Director of Research in the Extreme Environments Laboratory at the University of Portsmouth, shares the latest science behind the question.

As Burton drew on the writing of others and made a patchwork of texts within his Anatomy of Melancholy, each episode ends with a modern-day contribution for a new and updated Anatomy of Melancholy.

In this episode, Suzanna Cruickshank offers Status Quo, Pictures of Matchstick Men.

Simon Russell Beale brings the voice of Robert Burton to life with extracts from The Anatomy of Melancholy.

Presenter: Amy Liptrot
Reader: Simon Russell Beale
Producer: Ruth Abrahams
Series consultant: John Geddes

A Whistledown production for Radio 4 Show less