The first time it happened, Caroline Crampton was on a bus. Rain lashed the windows as the breath of weary commuters fogged the glass. The hum of casual conversation drifted along the aisle, mixed ...

Picture someone with hypochondria. It may be a friend who keeps an inventory of symptoms and ailments, is never without a doctor’s appointment and turns up armed with the latest from Google. Some ...

Caroline Crampton shares her own worries in “A Body Made of Glass,” a history of hypochondria that wonders whether newfangled technology drives us crazier. By Alexandra Jacobs When you purchase an ...

A Body Made of Glass, by Caroline Crampton (Ecco). The author of this thought-provoking exploration of hypochondria—which counts Marcel Proust and Charles Darwin among its sufferers—describes it as a ...

At breakfast the other week, I noticed a bulging lump on my son’s neck. Within minutes of anxious Googling, I’d convinced myself that he had a serious undiagnosed medical condition—and the more I ...

In the late 14th century, a spate of patients scattered across Europe developed an unusual delusion: They came to believe that their bodies were made of glass. Those suffering from this bizarre ...

In this riveting, genre-bending memoir, journalist Crampton (The Way to the Sea) traces the cultural and historical lineage of hypochondria. Pulling from ancient medical sources, film, literature, and ...