James Le Fanu
Pickled Parts
The Knife Man: The Extraordinary Life and Times of John Hunter, the Father of Modern Surgery
By Wendy Moore
Bantam Press 482pp £16.99
The eighteenth century had the usual drawbacks of pre-modern times – pestilence, slavery, amputations and dental extractions without anaesthesia – and much else besides. But this self-styled age of enlightenment had one decisive factor in its favour, an irrepressible conviction that reason would prevail and knowledge, zealously pursued, would abolish ignorance. This was a world full of promise, whose wonders, thanks to British naval power, were just waiting to be discovered: an era in which, for example, James Cook, during his three-year circumnavigation of the globe, could fill his ship’s hold with thousands of new and extraordinary specimens of plants and animals.
John Hunter, the tenth son of a struggling Scottish grain merchant, was a true product of that enlightenment, and the main interest of Wendy Moore’s vivid biography is her portrayal of the optimism of those times through the life of this remarkable man. Hunter arrived in London aged twenty, a
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
Twitter Feed
London's East End was long synonymous with poverty and sweatshops, while its West End was associated with glamour and high society. But when it came to the fashion industry, were the differences really so profound?
Sharman Kadish - Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers
Sharman Kadish: Winkle-pickers & Bum Freezers - Fashion City: How Jewish Londoners Shaped Global Style; Fashion City: ...
literaryreview.co.uk
In 1982, Donald Rumsfeld presented Saddam Hussein with a pair of golden spurs. Two decades later he was dropping bunker-busting bombs on his palaces.
Where did the US-Iraqi relationship go wrong?
Rory Mccarthy - The Case of the Vanishing Missiles
Rory Mccarthy: The Case of the Vanishing Missiles - The Achilles Trap: Saddam Hussein, the United States and the ...
literaryreview.co.uk
Barbara Comyns was a dog breeder, a house painter, a piano restorer, a landlady... And a novelist.
@nclarke14 on the lengths 20th-century women writers had to go to make ends meet:
Norma Clarke - Her Family & Other Animals
Norma Clarke: Her Family & Other Animals - Barbara Comyns: A Savage Innocence by Avril Horner
literaryreview.co.uk