Several friends in recent weeks have asked me how I feel about the end of “The Sopranos.” Am I upset there will be no more episodes? Am I happy with how creator David Chase resolves things? Will Tony survive?

[SPOILER ALERT: If you’re not 100 percent up-to-date on “The Sopranos” and want to be surprised, clip or print this column to read when you are.]

They ask me because I contend the 86 episodes of the HBO series are to television what Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” Dostoevsky’s “The Brothers Karamazov” and Van Morrison’s “Astral Weeks” are to their respective media. I hold objective reasons for that opinion, but something quite personal generates the intensity of it.

I first saw the show soon after the first season aired while spending a weekend with friends who taped it. After everyone in the house went to bed, I couldn’t sleep, so I popped it in. The next morning, my hosts woke to find me six or seven episodes in and still enthralled.

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The mix of raw violence, dark comedy and rich characters grabbed me the same way it did others. But Tony Soprano’s visits to his new psychiatrist, Dr. Jennifer Melfi, for treatment of panic attacks and depression gave me a secret reason to watch.

No one but my immediate family knew I had recently started treatment for depression. Seeing a therapist was as new to me as it was to Tony.

Both of us were scared and ashamed of having to pay a stranger to listen to us say things we could never tell anyone else. Both of us were big men tiptoeing in to see the shrink, scared to death that someone we knew would see us and tell everyone we were something less than men.

And for both of us, the secret eventually leaked, and we found the “stigmata,” as one of Tony’s associates hilariously misstated, of depression wasn’t as bad as we thought it could be.

But the disease itself is often far worse, as Tony’s creator apparently knows. In numerous interviews, including a piece by Peter Biskind in April’s “Vanity Fair,” Chase refers to his problems with depression.

Knowing Chase’s background, it’s possible to see the show as a fierce counterattack against a condition that is, for some, impossible to completely shake.

Tony is an ugly embodiment of depression. He inherits it from both sides of his family. He twists his therapy sessions to justify to himself the evil he does. He passes it on to his son Anthony Junior, who attempts suicide. He condemns it in his nephew and lieutenant who suffers a worse fate at Tony’s own hand.

This sixth and final season, in particular, takes a grim look at what depression can do to a man, his family and everyone around him. Barring a massive surprise, the show will end Sunday night on the same unremittingly pessimistic chord Chase sounds throughout the saga.

But Chase’s pessimism inspires me — even though, despite continuing treatment, I often feel worse than ever. Tony’s life is a clear guide on how not to live with depression. And Chase’s utter contempt for his loathsome alter ego offers incitement enough to fight through the misery even if nothing exists on the other side of it.

Aaron Keith Harris writes about politics, the media, pop culture and music and is a regular contributor to National Review Online and Bluegrass Unlimited. He can be reached at aaronkeithharris@gmail.com.