Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Sylvia Pamboukian

  • James Herriot and burnout

    Sylvia Pamboukian Moon Township, Pennsylvania, United States   A head of Yorkshire cattle in stone-walled field, 2007. Image taken by author. The James Herriot veterinary stories are so beloved by readers that they have inspired two television series called All Creatures Great and Small and have sold over sixty million copies.1 James Herriot is the pen…

  • Vampires and the Tuberculous Family

    Sylvia Pamboukian Moon Township, PA   Public health poster, New York National Child Welfare Association, ca. 1920–23. Library of Congress “The Tuberculous Family.” Listed by Library of Congress website with “No known restrictions on publication” An isolated village, a series of mysterious deaths, a mob in the graveyard at midnight—it sounds like the climax of…

  • Delicious death in Agatha Christie

    Sylvia A. Pamboukian Moon Township, Pennsylvania, United States   Common Tansy, Niagara Botanical Garden, Niagara Falls, Canada.  Photograph by author. It is a truth rarely acknowledged that an Agatha Christie village is a Jane Austen village gone wrong. Village spinsters still talk scandal over cozied tea pots, and plump vicars still carve Sunday roast with ecclesiastical…