The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine
By: Lindsey Fitzharris / Narrated By: Ralph Lister
Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
Superb narration takes us on a downright dirty jaunt into Victorian medicine
From the get-go, narrator Ralph Lister grabs us with the grisly scene The Butchering Art opens with. There are congealed pools of blood; there are individuals FAR too interested in hearing screams. And we’re also told that our hero Joseph Lister has been widely lauded for his ability to hack off a leg within seconds, doing the cutting then slipping the knife to his mouth where he will grip it with his teeth as he uses both now free hands to continue with the surgery. Lister (Narrator, not Joseph!) has gruff and scratchy tones, and ‘twould appear he truly relishes each horrific word as it tumbles from his mouth, delivering with masterfully macabre strokes, a time in history where surgery was the option of last resort.
The early part of the book has author Lindsey Fitzharris describing a world of medicine during Victorian England that’s part indecent, part utterly hilarious. There are people who rob fresh graves (Of the poor, usually) for bodies to offer up for dissection; there are students of medicine who use severed arms and legs to beat each other senseless as they jockey around, horse playing with great humor and much indecency.
Then there are those who flock to operating theaters to witness surgeries in progress. And that’s where Lister/narrator delivers his best performance! He does a Frenchman who runs to climb out a window, leaving medicine and its horrors behind, deciding to become a music composer instead. Lister/narrator does his quavering accent perfectly as the young man struggles to find words for just how frightening and completely and unutterably appalling the whole setup is. Hilarious, I tell you!
Then we’re introduced to Joseph Lister, an unassuming young man of Quaker stock who is prone to bouts of depression and excessive rumination. Lister comes in with all sorts of ideas, all sorts of mad medical skills. Unfortunately, he’s rather loud about these, and he does indeed find a few detractors in London. So it’s off to Scotland where he’ll make his biggest mark, working in a hospital and trying to figure out why the mortality rates for those hospitalized is so much higher than for those receiving treatment at their own homes.
Joseph Lister comes off as a clever, inquisitive, extremely intuitive young man who is quite simply out for doing something good. As he studies and has ideas, he tests his theories and discovers ways that miiiight cut down on infection. He’s given a few chances, and solutions are reinforced.
Along the way, he restructures the system for teaching young doctors (The only way to earn some money as work in hospitals doesn’t pay. Thaaat and dear ol’ dad sends a bit o’ cash his way every now and again). Lister proves himself to be an engaged and engaging teacher, inspiring his students like crazy. He also attempts to get his ways of using antiseptics accepted and put into practice, even tho’ places (And I’m looking at you, London!) are deadset against adopting such practices.
He argues strongly for his methods, even though at the time there are doctors who have specifically banned using antiseptics; there are doctors who have portraits of themselves whereby they’re in darkened rooms, surrounded by gore, bloodied instruments in the background.
Louis Pasteur makes an appearance as the two become friends, a friendship based on mutual respect. John Snow, the physician who created a map for the 1854 cholera map makes an appearance, and that was nice as I truly loved Steven Johnson’s The Ghost Map. And Queen Victoria has Lister take care of a long-ignored abscess—a procedure that, should anything go wrong, would be the death knell for Lister’s blossoming career.
This book is mostly about medicine and only briefly touches upon Joseph Lister as a man. But it’s enough so that we all get a sense of the man he was, and we have a chance to revere and respect that. A very, very good book.
I do sooo love a bloodbath! Now I just need to take a shower… using plenty of Lister’s carbolic acid, tho’!
As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.