The presentation and analysis of the famous novel "The Alienist" by the Brazilian writer Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis, published in 1882 in Papéis Avulsos, serves here as the basis for a brief discussion on the ideological and commercial aspects that orient current diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. These aspects, defined in psychiatric manuals, configure and establish a specific medical discourse and practice while, at the same time, produce both the drugs and the mental illness they supposedly combat.
Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis; literature; mental illness; ideology
