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36th out of 422 books
—
205 voters
The Knife Man: Blood, Body Snatching, and the Birth of Modern Surgery
by
Wendy Moore
In an era when bloodletting was considered a cure for everything from colds to smallpox, surgeon John Hunter was a medical innovator, an eccentric, and the person to whom anyone who has ever had surgery probably owes his or her life. In this sensational and macabre story, we meet the surgeon who counted not only luminaries Benjamin Franklin, Lord Byron, Adam Smith, and Tho...more
Paperback, 342 pages
Published
September 12th 2006
by Broadway
(first published 2005)
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An excellent combination of a compelling narrative of a most influential scientist with the evolution of the practice of surgery and medical science. Ms. Moore has artfully told the store of John Hunter and his rise from the son of a Scottish farmer to a pioneer in medical and anthropological studies. While there are many extremely graphic scenes conveyed to the reader, they are necessary to gain the appreciation of how barbaric some of the acceptable practices in medicine were at the time. This...more
Apr 09, 2012
Wealhtheow
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
someone who wants to read about a real-world Stephen Maturin
John Hunter rose from a poor Scottish farming family to become one of the leading men of science and medicine. His courage (he inserted a knife's point covered in pus into his urethra to see if syphilis and gonorrhea were the same disease! omg!), his lack of hypocrisy (in an age when even surgeons, who relied on dissections, refused to let their bodies be disturbed, he actually requested an autopsy), and his clear-sighted reliance on evidence instead of assumptions and tradition helped him trans...more
The Eighteenth Century ushered in what would become known as the "Enlightenment". A new philosophy of progress was proclaimed by intellectuals throughout Europe. They proclaimed that Reason would create a better future; science and technology, as Francis Bacon had taught, would enhance man's control over nature, and cultural progress, prosperity and the conquest of disease would follow. While Condorcet's vision is still not complete, Wendy Moore's biography of Dr. John Hunter, The Knife Man, cap...more
Wendy Moore's history of John Hunter, the almost cult figure who was, quite simply, a full advocate of the scientific method and thus not only the grandfather of modern surgical techniques but also an early proponent of evolution, almost a hundred years before Darwin, is a fascinating and enlightening read.
I picked up this book because I have an almost obsessive fixation with the ways of ancient medicine--bloodletting and such. Moore's book fully explores the techniques of the time that John Hu...more
I picked up this book because I have an almost obsessive fixation with the ways of ancient medicine--bloodletting and such. Moore's book fully explores the techniques of the time that John Hu...more
This guy has the coolest nickname ever. Therefore you should read this book.
Ok, ok. So basically John Hunter is a total stud. He nonchalantly invented or paved the way for some very necessary surgeries, was one of the first to realize, "Hey, maybe we should really have these medical students study human anatomy in detail before we allow them to cut people open," AND he actually did research and used trail and errors with his patients instead of just relying on the prevailing folk remedies and "...more
Ok, ok. So basically John Hunter is a total stud. He nonchalantly invented or paved the way for some very necessary surgeries, was one of the first to realize, "Hey, maybe we should really have these medical students study human anatomy in detail before we allow them to cut people open," AND he actually did research and used trail and errors with his patients instead of just relying on the prevailing folk remedies and "...more
This was a fascinating book about John Hunter, an anatomist, naturalist, surgeon, scientist, archivist, and innovator, who lived in England in the mid to late 1700s. In an era when bloodletting was the medical cure for most sicknesses, Hunter's fascination with biology/medicine and his incredible work ethic, drive, and insatiable curiosity drove him to make a remarkable number of discoveries, advances, and improvements in understanding anatomy, physiology, pathology etc. Along the way, he amasse...more
This is an excellent biography of John Hunter, who is considered to be the father of modern surgery. He was never given the title of Doctor, oddly enough, because surgeons were not considered physicians, though from what I can tell from the book, John Hunter was a lot more effective than any of his so-titled colleagues. This book is very detailed and includes illustrations and pictures depicting a selection of Hunter's anatomic preparations (he was England's most experienced anatomist, meaning h...more
When I was 19, I had an appendectomy. My mom, when she found out, was a bit scared (aside from the fact that it was surgery) due to the fact that a family member of hers, who had the same operation done on them years before, died from complications resulting from the procedure.
If it wasn't for John Hunter, with his emphasis on a scientific approach to surgery, where one assesses their mistakes and errors and then tries to find a way to change or correct them, then I probably would not have benef...more
If it wasn't for John Hunter, with his emphasis on a scientific approach to surgery, where one assesses their mistakes and errors and then tries to find a way to change or correct them, then I probably would not have benef...more
This book was fascinating. This was one of those impulse, bargain-bin buys that I'm really glad that I made. Exhaustively researched and very well written, this book tells the life story of John Hunter, who, according to Moore, is almost single-handedly responsible for turning Western surgery into a true scientific practice. My only real problem with the book is that Moore is clearly biased in favor of Hunter and his supporters and dismissive of his opponents, and it blatantly affects her presen...more
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This is a must read, for everyone with a brain. If you think this book will be dry, or boring, I assure you, nothing could be further from the truth. The book is a must read, and I mean that not in an Oprah book club style, "Oh girl, you must read this!*giggle giggle*" No. It is a must read because these are the things we do not but MUST know and ponder; to stop taking for granted our aspirins and penicillin and the very existence of something that can be described as "minor surgery". WE must wr...more
I loved this book! Picked it up randomly in a book sale at the local library and boy, was it a good idea. Not my typical book genre but the writing was just so good that I couldn't put it down.
This book is all about John Hunter, a humble Scottish man with a tremendous zeal for knowledge. Fascinated with science, nature,life, and death, he went on to become London's most famous (and often hated) surgeon and teacher. He defied many of his society's taboos and courageously pursued his obsession wi...more
This book is all about John Hunter, a humble Scottish man with a tremendous zeal for knowledge. Fascinated with science, nature,life, and death, he went on to become London's most famous (and often hated) surgeon and teacher. He defied many of his society's taboos and courageously pursued his obsession wi...more
John Hunter; Father of Modern Surgery
The Knife Man is a very informative book, in which the biographer Wendy Moore, captures the life of John Hunter. John was one of six children, born to John Hunter Sr. and Agnes Paul just south of Glasgow, Scotland on February 14th, 1728.
During his childhood he was ignored by his father, and "indulged by his mother." (Moore, pg 16) Even though he was sent daily to the village school, whenever he could find the time, he skipped lessons to go out searching in th...more
The Knife Man is a very informative book, in which the biographer Wendy Moore, captures the life of John Hunter. John was one of six children, born to John Hunter Sr. and Agnes Paul just south of Glasgow, Scotland on February 14th, 1728.
During his childhood he was ignored by his father, and "indulged by his mother." (Moore, pg 16) Even though he was sent daily to the village school, whenever he could find the time, he skipped lessons to go out searching in th...more
Purely from the standpoint of a girl reading a book, this one was highly absorptive, thoughtfully composed, and sprang to life with rich, vivid emotions and a whole lot of visceral pain. From a historical and scientific standpoint, Moore’s telling of the life of John Hunter picks apart the multifarious and terrifying aspects of 18th century medical knowledge and surgical practice, strand by strand, like a tortured muscle. No matter how you vivisect it, this book is a compelling achievement.
Howev...more
Howev...more
This is a very fine biography of John Hunter, the fascinating 18th century surgeon who applied scientific methods - reason, observation and experimentation - to the field of surgery, at a time when his contemporaries were still studying the theories of the ancient Greeks and surgical techniques had changed little since medieval times.
During the course of his medical career Hunter would dissect thousands of human cadavers, stolen from London’s graveyards because there was no legitimate way to obt...more
During the course of his medical career Hunter would dissect thousands of human cadavers, stolen from London’s graveyards because there was no legitimate way to obt...more
A fascinating biography of one of the fathers of modern surgery. This is not for the squeamish or those who cannot bear to admit or face the realities of what brought us to our vaunted state of enlightenment. It's a progressive world that we live in and sometimes scientists and researchers step outside the boundaries of what is strictly legal in order to make fascinating new discoveries and push the boundaries of both what we know and what we're capable of. The ethics are a little dodgy, in some...more
Mar 29, 2012
Denali
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
2012,
chicago-public-library
An incredible book recommended to me by Marsha. It's a little history, a little science, a little adventure, all tied up in a meticulously researched, well written narrative. John Hunter was a fascinating person. Moore dodges a lot of the typical stumbling blocks I've seen in books of this nature. She balances detail heavy descriptions and archival research with a lively writing style. She manages to write a chronological story but still have strong defined themes. She sketches connections betwe...more
A fascinating and sometimes gorily-detailed biography of an eighteenth century surgeon, anatomist, and naturalist. I just loved this book - the science/knowledge stuff is interesting (especially if you're interested in being horrified by medical practices of the 18th century), the characters are lively, and the details are... well, very detailed. Wendy Moore really transports you into Hunter's anatomy rooms and takes you into the grisly depths of rotting corpses, meticulous anatomical preparatio...more
Jul 02, 2012
Neal Jones
added it
I had never heard of this man, John Hunter, before picking this book at random from the history section of my bookstore, but I liked the description on the back cover, and the subtitle definitely caught my attention. This was an excellent biography, although quite gory and graphic at times, and while it made me thankful that I was born in the late 20th century and not in 18th century Georgian London, I was pleased with the writing style and substance of this biography. It did what all good biogr...more
What a fascinating man! A great example of what Gardner was talking about with his argument for a "Naturalist" intelligence category. Also interesting to note how far we have drifted away from his ideals of continually observing, testing, modifing, and testing again; I was thinking of the pervasiveness of prescription medications (sort of like the bloodletting that Hunter's patients expected) and the uproar when the medical community introduced new timelines for tests like mammograms and pap sme...more
The Knife Man is a biography of the Scottish surgeon John Hunter, who, in the mid-18th century, revolutionized his discipline by insisting that observation and experimentation were more valid sources of knowledge than relying on the writings of the ancients. Wendy Moore tells a rollicking good tale (although since most of it is about surgery in an age before antibiotics, painkillers or the germ theory of medicine, there are descriptions so vivid that if you’re even a tiny bit squeamish, you migh...more
I thoroughly enjoyed this historical account of comparative anatomy and physiology in its infancy. John Hunter was a true medical scientist and researcher. He was an extraordinary surgeon -- always changing his technique to follow the situation and incorporate his observations from past experience. As obvious as this may seem in this day and age, it seems that the physician's duty in Georgian England to follow the status quo. Hunter didn't ever conform to that way of life and we are far richer f...more
This was an interesting book, if a bit dry and lacking in illustration. Hunter's controversy-bedecked life is an interesting one. He was both admirably correct and terribly wrong on many counts, but relied on his own observations and testing and not on prevailing opinion. His minute studies of anatomy (thanks to wholesale body-snatching and a ruinous collecting of animals) led him to the conclusion that life on earth evolves. His study of fossils eroded away any idea that one forty day flood was...more
Biography of John Hunter, a British surgeon plying his trade around the turn of the 18th & 19th century.
Absolutely fascinating. Hunter developed from a rough Scots farm lad into a pioneering surgeon, lecturer and teacher in London. Due to his incessent search for truth and amazing manual dexterity, he founded many basis for modern medicine and surgery.
Some of the more interesting aspects of his life include his dealings with body snatchers (and his role as one himself), his innovations in m...more
Absolutely fascinating. Hunter developed from a rough Scots farm lad into a pioneering surgeon, lecturer and teacher in London. Due to his incessent search for truth and amazing manual dexterity, he founded many basis for modern medicine and surgery.
Some of the more interesting aspects of his life include his dealings with body snatchers (and his role as one himself), his innovations in m...more
I think this would even interest someone who was not normally a biography reader. It was fascinating and enlightening. As a pioneer surgeon during the 18th century when surgery was crude and painful, John Hunter worked hard to further his field, engaging in controversial and sometimes illegal activities such as body snatching just to be able to perform his vital research. He single-handedly advanced the field of surgery and greatly improved the quality of medical care for the rich and the poor a...more
As an example of the biography genre, strictly middle of the road in terms of interest, writing style, and entertainment value. I think I actually read this book before, as there were vague stirrings of familiarity as I read through it again, which I suppose speaks volumes for the vividness of the material. At times it felt like I was reading a college-level paper rather than a mature biographer. Anyway, if you're interested in the beginning of modern surgery, a mildly interesting read.
An interesting look at the beginning of modern surgery -- which involved corpse stealing, dissection of not-quite-executed criminals and semi-scientific gentlemen cutting lots of people apart. It did drag in places, but was overall a fairly solidly written biography. (The blood and gore helped.)
I picked it up at the Huntarian Museum in London. I have to say, it is a nice accompaniment to a visit as the museum retains many of the specimens discussed in the book.
I picked it up at the Huntarian Museum in London. I have to say, it is a nice accompaniment to a visit as the museum retains many of the specimens discussed in the book.
After a visit to the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons, London, I bought this book and became riveted by Hunter's story. I knew nothing about the history of surgery or how recent our modern health understanding is. The descriptions of the barbaric operations as well as the experiments on living animals are pretty grisly, but the insights are fantastic. Definitely a great read.
I am not typically attracted to the historical biographies, but on a whim I bought this book. Wow, was I surprised. I was drawn into the world of the mid 1700's. when surgery was another word for human butchery. No scientific method or even sterility came into play. The book weaves a engaging story and creates a vivid portrait of the day to day life of John Hunter.
An excellent biography of a pioneering 18th Century British surgeon and anatomist. It not only tells the story of John Hunter's life, but gives a very good overview of the state of medicine and science at the time. A lot of really interesting stuff, although it may be a bit gory for some tastes. (I was okay with everything except for the description of the vivisection of a poor dog.) This is Wendy Moore's first book, and it's a good one. I'm looking forward to see what she writes next.
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Wendy Moore worked as a journalist and freelance writer for more than 25 years. She has always been interested in history, and as a result, began researching the history of medicine.
The Knife Man is her first book.
More about Wendy Moore...
The Knife Man is her first book.
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Feb 26, 2012 08:46pm