The Last Asylum Essay

The Last Asylum, as Barbara Taylor notes in the prologue of the book, is a book that is not meant to be your average misery memoir (Taylor XV). Instead, she makes the claim where the book is more of a a combination of both a history and personal story, and with the “yes and no” answer immediately insinuating it is not your typical sad story. But as her account continues, I notices there were other goals Taylor attempts to achieve. Some of these goals include the following: to show how she changes over her experience in the asylum, to provide a brief history of the asylum system in the United Kingdom and her impressions of it, and also to express her personal state of mind throughout the novel, which include her relationship with the psychoanalyst

At the end of her memoir, she was expressing a form of gratitude towards both the people around her, and also to an extent, Friern. According to a section from the Epilogue, she reflects on how Friern has dramatically changed her views of the world (Taylor 252-253).

“People need other people. True independence — for everyone, well or ill — is rooted in social connections; without this, it is mere isolation and loneliness. This deep need for connectedness is insufficiently acknowledged throughout the whole of our society, not just in the case of people with mental disorders”

Based on this section, it can be inferred that her view on life have definitely opened up for the better since she references how the relationships between people are important no matter what you assume to be true. Also, this excerpt signifies how thankful she is to the people around her because when you compare this section to the first third of the memoir, it is the complete opposite of what she was before heading into Friern. Also, this can also argue how much Taylor relied on “V” throughout her experience in Friern because their relationship has already surpassed what a general psychoanalyst to patient relationship should be, at least in the eyes of Taylor. In terms of expressing thanks to Friern, she did it in a way of reflecting on her experience through that system, which could be seen when she said the following (Taylor