Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Addiction

  • Dr. Mikhail Bulgakov and morphine

    Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “During the years of war and revolution it was hard to find a hospital without morphine-addicted patients.”1– Vladimir Gorovoy-Shaltan, physician specialist in addiction medicine Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov (1891–1940) was a Russian physician, novelist, and playwright. He earned his medical degree from the University of Kiev (now Kyiv) in 1916. In 1919 he…

  • The flower lady

    Jonathan B. Ferrini La Jolla, California, United States   Photos by author. The Flores Family Flower Shop was founded by my grandfather as a roadside stand. It has now been a favorite flower shop in San Diego for the past fifty years. Six days a week at 4:30 in the morning, I drive the truck…

  • When daydreaming becomes a problem

    S.T Gamage Colombo, Sri Lanka   Where the thoughts live by Marija Tiurina. Published with permission. “They say there’s no harm in daydreaming, but there is.” — Charlaine Harris   An excessive amount of daydreaming can lead to a psychological condition called maladaptive daydreaming (MD). It is also known as daydreaming disorder. Professor Eliezer Somer…

  • A very Victorian drug

    Anita CookeNew Brunswick, Canada On February 14, 1862, the Daily News reported the “Death of a Lady from an Overdose of Laudanum.”1 Four nights earlier, Dante Gabriel Rossetti had discovered his wife, Lizzie, in a coma with an empty bottle of laudanum by her side. Despite efforts from doctors, she died a few hours later.…

  • “John Barleycorn Must Die”: Addiction attributions in Jack London’s Alcoholic Memoirs

    Ad A. Kaptein Barend W. Florijn Pim B. van der Meer Leiden, the Netherlands   L’Arlésienne (portret van Madame Ginoux). Vincent Van Gogh. 1890. Kröller-Müller Museum. A thousand words every morning—with iron discipline, Jack London adhered to his writing routine. Later in the day, he would turn to John Barleycorn: beer, wine, whisky, and brandy.…

  • Art and alcohol

    Giovanni CeccarelliRoma, Italy In the late 1940s Elaine de Kooning, wife of one of the most eminent exponents of American abstract expressionism (Willem de Kooning), commented that the whole art world of her time had become alcoholic. Yet even earlier, perhaps always, drinking and drunkenness had attracted the interest of many artists. In a drinking…

  • Viktor Frankl: the meaning of a life

    Anne Jacobson Oak Park, Illinois, United States   Figure 1. Viktor Frankl, 1965. Photo by Prof. Dr. Franz Vesely via Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 3.0 DE. Not long before the Dachau concentration camp was liberated in April 1945, Viktor Emil Frankl was seriously ill with typhus and writing feverishly on stolen scraps of paper, determined to…

  • The derailment of Franklin Pierce

    Jacob Appel New York, New York, United States Few subjects have attracted as much attention from medical historians, both well-founded and speculative, as the health of United States presidents. Considerable debate exists over the extent of impairment caused by Lincoln’s bouts of melancholia,1 Grant’s alcoholism,2 Wilson’s stroke,3 and Coolidge’s depression4—to name only those chief executives from…

  • Lucid interval

    Emma ManuelEshwar RajeshChennai, India Even during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, some people like me were silently grateful for the opportunity to spend some time with their family. Born as a single child whose parents got frequent transfers, I had lived with my grandparents to get proper schooling, and then some twenty years passed…

  • A moonie

    Simon Wein Petach Tikvah, Israel   Untitled blue face, Acrylic on Canvas, 50/70 cm, 2017. Painting by Daniel Wein. Published with permission of the artist. Wally Moon was a legend who stood at least 1.90 meters tall. The most striking things about him were his appearance and his gruffness. When I met him during my…