[Review of the results and developments of the research on suicide notes].

Suicide notes and diaries of suicidal people give an insight into their thoughts and feelings right before their death, therefore, they are valuable tools of psychological research. This paper leads through the most important stages of the research on suicide notes, which was established by Shneidman and Farberow in the 1950's. The suicide theory that was developed by them and was further elaborated by Ringel and Beck gave inspiration to many remarkable researchers, such as Antoon Leenaars and David Lester. Our paper summarises the most important tendencies, starting from the analyses of simulated and empirical suicide notes, which proved to be a deadlock, and typologies, descriptive analyses (age, gender comparisons), , arriving to the latest trends of transcultural application of structured framework, and discursive approaches. The discursive approach, which was developed in Hungary focuses on the influence that culture and language have on suicidal attempts.