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Synopsis
A successor to his popular book A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities, this new collection of essays by Jan Bondeson illustrates various anomalies of human development, the lives of the remarkable individuals concerned, and social reactions to their extraordinary bodies.
Bondeson examines historical cases of dwarfism, extreme corpulence, giantism, conjoined twins, dicephaly, and extreme hairiness; his broader theme, however, is the infinite range of human experience. The dicephalous Tocci brothers and Lazarus Colloredo (from whose belly grew his malformed conjoined twin), the Swedish giant, and the king of Poland's dwarf—Bondeson considers these individuals not as "freaks" but as human beings born with sometimes appalling congenital deformities. He makes full use of original French, German, Dutch, Polish, and Scandinavian sources and explores elements of ethnology, literature, and cultural history in his diagnoses.
Heavily illustrated with woodcuts, engravings, oil paintings, and photographs, The Two-Headed Boy and Other Medical Marvels combines a scientist's scrutiny with a humanist's wonder at the endurance of the human spirit.
About the Author:
Jan Bondeson is a physician specializing in rheumatology and internal medicine. He works at a major research institute in London and is the author of The Feejee Mermaid and Other Essays in Natural and Unnatural History, also from Cornell, and A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities.
Foreward Magazine
Bonderson is at his best in explaining how careless language, quirks of chronology, and gross scientific misconceptions led to widespread belief in impossible circumstances. . . . For the hungry, the bibliography is a feast.