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Review by Tom Bragg.

Both the title and subtitle of Lindsey Fitzharris’s popular medical history—The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister’s Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine—hint at the sensationalism, the often lurid details with which the author baits the hook of her narrative. The creator of popular websites and a Youtube series about medical and surgical subjects, Fitzharris is clearly at home with such material, and weaves shudder-inducing factoids and interesting digressions freely throughout the book’s general story, that of Lister’s career, his developing interest in microscopy, his suspicions about the miasma “bad air” theory of disease, and his eventual role as the founder of antiseptic medicine.

In its essentials, this account might take up half as much space as the (already slim) book’s 230-odd pages, while a more personal and introspective account might occupy many more. Joseph Lister lived to a ripe old age—indeed, his life straddles the entire Victorian Era—and his accomplishments are legion and impressive. According to the book’s blurb, Fitzharris’s aim has been to “dramatically {reconstruct] Lister’s career path,” and thus to celebrate the surgeon and innovator by contrasting his achievements with the “grisly” situations and contexts in which he worked. Continue reading “Book Review: The Butchering Art”