Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Spring 2026

  • The death of Emperor Caesar Augustus

    Augustus’s death in CE 14 ended one of the most remarkable lives in Roman history. Born Gaius Octavius in 63 BCE, he was adopted posthumously by Julius Caesar as his son and chief heir. After Julius Caesar’s assassination in 44 BCE, he formed an alliance with Mark Antony and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, hunted down Caesar’s…

  • Max Thorek: An ignored surgical superstar

    Jayant RadhakrishnanChicago, Illinois, United States Much of what we know about Dr. Max Thorek is from his informative and eminently readable autobiography A Surgeon’s World, which is sprinkled with entertaining and enlightening vignettes.1 Max Thorek (1880–1960) was born in a town in the Tátra mountains on the Austro-Hungarian border. His father was a physician and…

  • Proust’s medical madeleine: Medicine and the making of À la recherche du temps perdu

    Vivian McAlisterLondon, Ontario, Canada Marcel Proust was expected to waste his life. To acquaintances of the Proust family, he appeared charming, delicate, over-refined, and incapacitated by an illness that seemed to excuse him from the ordinary obligations of career and usefulness. Valentine Thomson, remembering the household, called the young Marcel “a charming but fantastic idler.”…

  • The death of Joseph Stalin

    On March 1, 1953, the most feared man in the world lay on the floor dying in the Kuntsevo Dacha, outside Moscow, in a pool of his own urine. He had been there for hours. Guards had discovered him sometime after midnight—crumpled beside his bed, a half-empty glass of mineral water nearby—but no one dared…

  • A collective narrative of Black women physicians in the United States

    Kathryne DycusUnited States In Twice As Hard: The Stories of Black Women Who Fought to Become Physicians, From the Civil War to the 21st Century, Jasmine Brown hands us a collection of Black women physicians’ narratives and inserts her own into the mix. “Initially, I wanted to look at past socio-structural barriers preventing Black women…

  • A doctor does not know how to change a tire!

    Omer AltamimiJeddah, Saudi Arabia A doctor spends years learning how to recognize sepsis, read a scan, close a wound, and speak to a frightened patient. Then one day, he may stand beside a flat tire and realize he does not even know where to place the jack. He may open the trunk with the confidence…

  • The death of Cicero

    The death of Marcus Tullius Cicero marked the end of one of the most brilliant careers in the history of the Roman Republic. Cicero was not only a statesman and lawyer but also a philosopher, writer, and defender of republican government. His assassination in 43 BCE symbolized the collapse of the Roman Republic and the…

  • Sahara, the desert that once was green 

    The Sahara is the largest desert in the world, stretching across North Africa and covering nine million square kilometers from the Atlantic to the Red Sea.  It has a population of some 2.5 million people, many of whom are nomadic. Although the term “Sahara” conveys an image of emptiness, just as when H.L Mencken wrote…

  • Damascus, the oldest capital city in the world

    Damascus, capital of Syria, was settled as early as 9000 BCE. It stands on the eastern slopes of the Anti-Lebanon Mountains, nourished by the Barada River. The city was never abandoned or swallowed by desert sands; it always served as a center for trade, culture, religion, and medicine. Throughout its rich history, Damascus was conquered…

  • Medical themes in the writing of Richard Graves

    Avi OhryTel Aviv, Israel Richard Graves (1715–1804) was an English cleric, poet, and novelist. He published a novel in 1773 titled The Spiritual Quixote; or, The Summer’s Ramble of Mr. Geoffry Wildgoose. In 1732, Graves finished his studies in Oxford and became a fellow at All Souls College. He moved to London to study medicine…