Book description
WINNER OF THE MEDICAL JOURNALISTS' OPEN BOOK AWARD 2005
Revered and feared in equal measure, John Hunter was the most famous
surgeon of eighteenth-century London. Rich or poor, aristocrat or
human freak, suffering Georgians knew that Hunter's skills might well
save their lives Âbut if he failed, their corpses could end up on his
dissecting table, their bones and organs destined for display in his
remarkable, macabre museum.
Maverick medical pioneer, adored teacher, brilliant naturalist,
Hunter was a key figure of the Enlightenment who transformed surgery,
advanced biological understanding and even anticipated the
evolutionary theories of Darwin. He provided inspiration both for Dr
Jekyll and Dr Dolittle. But the extremes to which he went to pursue
his scientific mission raised question marks then as now.
John Hunter's extraordinary world comes to life in this remarkable,
award-winning biography written by a wonderful new talent.
Wendy Moore is a writer and journalist. After working as a reporter
for local newspapers she has specialized in health and medical topics
for more than twenty years. As a freelance journalist her work has been
published in a range of newspapers and magazines, including the
Guardian
, the
Observer
and the
British Medical Journal
, and has won several awards. Having written extensively on medical
history, she obtained the Diploma in the History of Medicine from the
Society of Apothecaries (DHMSA) in 1999 and won the Maccabean prize for
best dissertation that year. She lives in south London with her partner,
Peter, also a journalist, and two children, Sam and Susannah.
The
Knife Man
is her first book.
