Synopses & Reviews
We assume we know our bodies well, but how many of us really understand why seizures occur, or why cataracts obscure our vision, or why our livers can regenerate? In
Adventures in Human Being, Gavin Francis leads readers on a journey into the hidden pathways of the human body, from the brainand#8217;s pea-sized pineal glandand#151;the so-called seat of the souland#151;to the delicate machinery of the foot.
Drawing on his work as a physician as well as his experiences traveling and practicing medicine throughout the world, Francis blends case studies and episodes from medical history, philosophy, and literature to describe the body in sickness and in health, in living and in dying.
At its heart, Adventures in Human Being is a meditation on what it means to be human. Poetic, eloquent, and profoundly perceptive, Adventures in Human Being will transform the way you view your body.
Review
Hilary Manteland#147;A sober and beautiful book about the landscape of the human body: thought-provoking and eloquent.and#8221;
John Berger
and#147;Wonderful, subtle, unpretentious.... I have never read a book like this one and I recommend it wholeheartedly. Reading it, you feel better.and#8221;
Review
PRAISE FOR ADVENTURES IN HUMAN BEING:and#147;In Francis's beautifully written, exquisitely thoughtful, and completely captivating cartography, the body is a superbly-lit museum filled with treasures, and Dr. Francis the perfect guide who deftly weaves together science and story to reveal the wondrous flesh-and-blood underpinnings of our daily lives. It's a spellbinding view.and#8221;
and#151;Diane Ackerman, author of The Zookeeperand#8217;s Wife and The Human Age
and#147;A sober and beautiful book about the landscape of the human body: thought-provoking and eloquent.and#8221;
and#151;Hilary Mantel
and#147;Wonderful, subtle, unpretentious.... I have never read a book like this one and I recommend it wholeheartedly. Reading it, you feel better.and#8221;
and#151;John Berger
and#147;In a series of deft essays on anatomy, starting with the head and working down to the feet, Francis moves skillfully between the scientific and the aesthetic, anatomical fact and emotional consequence, to craft a profound yet highly readable account of the intimate, inextricable relationship between the physical body and what some still call the soul.and#8221;
and#151;Irish Times
and#147;Clever, strangely beautifuland#133; The style is crisp and fast and the human tales irresistible.and#8221;
and#151;The Times (London)
Synopsis
"Adventures in Human Being, with its deft mix of the clinical and the lyrical, is a triumph of the eloquent brain and the compassionate heart."--Wall Street Journal
We assume we know our bodies intimately, but for many of us they remain uncharted territory, an enigma of bone and muscle, neurons and synapses. How many of us understand the way seizures affect the brain, how the heart is connected to well-being, or the why the foot holds the key to our humanity? In Adventures in Human Being, award-winning author Gavin Francis leads readers on a journey into the hidden pathways of the human body, offering a guide to its inner workings and a celebration of its marvels.
Drawing on his experiences as a surgeon, ER specialist, and family physician, Francis blends stories from the clinic with episodes from medical history, philosophy, and literature to describe the body in sickness and in health, in life and in death. When assessing a young woman with paralysis of the face, Francis reflects on the age-old difficulty artists have had in capturing human expression. A veteran of the war in Iraq suffers a shoulder injury that Homer first described three millennia ago in the Iliad. And when a gardener pricks her finger on a dirty rose thorn, her case of bacterial blood poisoning brings to mind the comatose sleeping beauties in the fairy tales we learn as children.
At its heart, Adventures in Human Being is a meditation on what it means to be human. Poetic, eloquent, and profoundly perceptive, this book will transform the way you view your body.
Synopsis
From an award-winning author and physician, a tour of the human body from head to toe, using medical case studies, history, and literature to illuminate how our bodies work
Synopsis
We assume we know our bodies intimately, but for many of us they remain uncharted territory. How many of us understand the way seizures affect the brain, how the heart is connected to wellbeing, or the why the foot carries the key to our humanity? In
Adventures in Human Being, award-winning author Gavin Francis leads readers on a journey into the hidden pathways of the human body, offering a guide to its inner workings and a celebration of its marvels.
Drawing on his experiences as a surgeon, ER specialist, and family physician, Francis blends stories from the clinic with episodes from medical history, philosophy, and literature to describe the body in sickness and in health, in living and in dying. At its heart, Adventures in Human Being is a meditation on what it means to be human. Poetic, eloquent, and profoundly perceptive, this book will transform the way you view your body.
About the Author
Gavin Francis is a physician and the award-winning author of two previous books, True North: Travels in Arctic Europe and Empire Antarctica: Ice, Silence, and Emperor Penguins, which won the Scottish Book of the Year Award, was shortlisted for the Ondaatje Prize and the Costa Prize, and was named a best book of the year by the Economist, the Financial Times, and the Scotsman. A regular speaker at the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, Francis also writes for the New York Review of Books, the Guardian, the Times, the London Review of Books, and Granta.
Table of Contents
A note on confidentialityForeword
Brain
1. Neurosurgery of the Soul
2. Seizures, Sanctity and Psychiatry Head
3. Eye: A Renaissance of Vision
4. Face: Beautiful Palsy
5. Inner Ear: Voodoo and Vertigo
Chest
6. Lung: Breath of Life
7. Heart: Listening to the Pulse
8. Breast: Two Views on Healing Upper Limb
9. Shoulder: Arms and Armour
10. Wrist and Hand: Punched, Cut and Crucified Abdomen
11. Kidney: The Ultimate Gift
12. Liver: A Fairy-Tale Ending
13. Large Bowel and Rectum: A Magnificent Work of Art Pelvis
14. Genitals: Of Making Babies
15. Womb: Thresholds of Life and Death
16. Afterbirth: Eat it, Burn it, Bury it under a Tree
Lower Limb
17. Hip: Jacob and the Angel
18. Feet and Toes: Footsteps in the Basement
Afterword
Acknowledgements
Notes on Sources
Index