Tag: Medicine
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Carl Gustav Jung
Anne JacobsonOak Park, Illinois, United States In the autumn of 1913, Carl Gustav Jung was traveling alone by train through the rust and amber forest of the Swiss countryside. The thirty-eight-year-old psychiatrist had been lately troubled by strange dreams and a rising sense of tension, but the snow-capped peaks of his beloved Alps soothed him…
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Hector Berlioz: from medical school to music conservatory
Michael YafiHouston, Texas, United States Louis-Hector Berlioz (1803–1869) was born in La Côte-Saint-André, France. His father was a well-known physician in his hometown in the French Alps and wanted his son to follow in his footsteps. At the age of eighteen, Hector was sent to Paris to study medicine.1 Although he was passionate about music,…
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The wayward Paracelsus
JMS PearceEast Yorks, England Alterius non sit qui suus esse potestLet no man be another’s who can be himself Paracelsus 1552 Paracelsus was the most original, controversial character of the Renaissance,1 who brazenly questioned and condemned the dictates of Galen and other ancient physicians. In an age of mysticism and alchemy, this solitary figure laid…
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Ludwig van Beethoven: music and medicine
Michael YafiChaden YafiHouston, Texas, United States December 2020 marked the 250th anniversary of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven. The causes of the composer’s deafness and his death at the age of fifty-six have remained unknown, even after an autopsy carried out soon after his death. Beethoven was also known to have mood swings, which…
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C. Miller Fisher: Stroke in the twentieth century
Arpan K. Banerjee Solihull, UK Stroke, in spite of its serious and widespread impact, had long received little interest from physicians. C. Miller Fisher, one of the twentieth century’s outstanding neurologists and researchers, revolutionized the management of stroke. In this well-researched and readable biography, Louis Caplan, a distinguished Harvard neurologist and former trainee of Miller…
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Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin OM, FRS (1910-1994)
JMS PearceHull, England Dorothy Hodgkin (Fig 1), though not by religion, had close Quaker affinities through her marriage and through her spirited pacifism. She possessed a unique mixture of scientific skills that allowed her to extend the use of X-rays to reveal the structures of compounds, a technical venture far more complex than anything attempted…
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Not as a Stranger: The desperate medical student
Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden In order to study medicine, a future doctor needs motivation, some intelligence, a medical school, and the ability to pay for the education. Morton Thompson’s 1954 novel Not As a Stranger follows a young man through childhood, medical school, and beyond. A film based on the book was released in 1955, and…
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Walter Russell Brain DM FRCP FRS (1895–1966)
JMS Pearce East Yorks, England Russell Brain (Fig 1) was born at Clovelly, Denmark Road, Reading, on 23 October 1895, the only son of Walter John Brain, solicitor, and his wife, Edith Alice. A quiet, reserved man of enormous intellect and integrity, he was revered as an eminent neurologist, philosopher, and author. At Mill Hill School…