46 pages • 1 hour read
Nellie BlyTen Days In A Mad-House
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1887A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Background
Literary Context: Stunt Journalism
Ten Days in a Mad-House not only brought attention to severe abuses in mental health institutions but also pioneered a bold genre in reporting known as “stunt” journalism. Also called “immersion” journalism, this style involves reporters actively placing themselves in specific environments or adopting particular roles to directly experience and expose hidden truths. Nellie Bly’s approach—going undercover in an asylum to document conditions firsthand—launched a wave of investigative works grounded in direct participation, sparking public interest in reform and validating journalism as a powerful vehicle for social change. Her work’s popularity and impact opened doors for other journalists to similarly risk personal safety to expose societal injustices.
Stunt journalism became a highly effective means of capturing attention in the early 1900s, especially as society grappled with pressing social issues. In 1914, Djuna Barnes followed in Bly’s footsteps, examining the horrific practice of force-feeding in women’s prisons in her harrowing piece “How It Feels to Be Forcibly Fed.” Her work raised awareness about the treatment of suffragettes and highlighted the need for reforms in prison practices. Decades later, journalist Barbara Ehrenreich adopted immersion tactics to expose the struggles of low-income workers in her groundbreaking 2001 book Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America. Ehrenreich lived on a minimum wage for several months to highlight the challenges faced by the working poor, offering a fresh, unfiltered perspective on poverty in America. These reporters—alongside others, including George Orwell, Jessica Mitford, and Hunter S. Thompson—have used immersion to reveal truths about experiences and injustices not readily accessible to the general public, crafting narratives that personalize and expose systemic societal problems.
Bly’s Ten Days in a Mad-House not only ignited conversations about mental health reform but also cemented immersion journalism as a vital method of capturing stories that would otherwise remain hidden. By stepping into her subjects’ lives, Bly gave readers a rare, raw glimpse into the struggles and abuses that words alone often fail to convey, proving that firsthand reporting can enact substantial social change.
Historical Context: 1800s Mental Health
In the late 19th century, the field of mental health was marked by limited knowledge and harmful practices. Words like “insane,” “mad,” and “lunatic asylum” were common terminology and are preserved in Ten Days in a Mad-House as historically accurate reflections of Bly’s experience. Such language was entrenched in medical and legal texts, often leading to labels and treatments that further stigmatized those diagnosed with a mental illness, especially women, who were disproportionately institutionalized for behaviors or conditions deemed “unfeminine” or “hysterical.”
Mental health institutions were intended to provide care but often functioned as containment facilities for those with mental health conditions, the poor, and those deemed socially “unmanageable.” Once committed, patients typically had little chance of being heard or released. Without effective treatments, many institutions relied on methods that are now acknowledged as abusive, including isolation, cold-water baths, force-feeding, and even chemical sedation. Additionally, the widely prescribed “rest cure”—which became a standard treatment for upper-class women experiencing “nervous conditions” or mild depression—encouraged prolonged bed rest and isolation, with a strict regimen designed to keep the patient entirely passive.
For women, the rest cure often signified society’s attempt to enforce strict behavioral expectations, frequently prescribed for those experiencing symptoms attributed to “hysteria,” a diagnosis rooted in sexist stereotypes about women’s supposed fragility and emotional instability. This treatment method was criticized by patients like Charlotte Perkins Gilman, whose story “The Yellow Wallpaper” illustrates the harmful effects of the rest cure on women’s mental health.
Bly’s work provides a critical lens into the era’s mental health practices, particularly as it relates to female patients. Her firsthand accounts offer evidence of neglect and brutality, exposing a system that prioritized control over care. By illustrating the horrifying conditions of Blackwell’s Island and emphasizing the consequences of inadequate mental health understanding, Bly’s Ten Days in a Mad-House contributed to an urgent call for reform, leading to increased public scrutiny and a gradual shift toward more humane treatment practices in mental health care.
