This chapter discusses the potential for a history of loneliness. It opens up
historical handling of loneliness as a theme, pointing to the issues of health, coping
strategies, theories of change, locational questions, and issues concerning the family
and historical demography. It assesses how lone-living influences analysis of
loneliness, and considers in this connection the marked growth of sole living in
Western societies.
Keywords: Ageing, Aloneness, Individualism, Isolation, Loneliness, Nuclear
family, Singletons, Solitaries, The elderly, Welfare.
