Summary
Though it might come as a surprise to fans of the popular television series, "Grey's Anatomy" (now in its fifth season on ABC), well over a century before neurosurgeon Derek "McDreamy" Shepherd (played by actor Patrick Dempsey) was wrestling with life- and-death consequences at the fictive Seattle Grace, the very real British anatomist, pathologist and surgeon Henry Gray was taking advantage of a new abundance of fresh corpses and an interested publisher to complete his iconic human anatomy textbook commonly known as "Gray's Anatomy."
The story of that book is the subject of Ruth Richardson's gracefully written, richly detailed "The Making of Mr. Gray's Anatomy." She begins by reminding readers that the book "many thousands - possibly millions - of medical students worldwide have used on their way to becoming doctors and surgeons" was the work of not one but two men: Henry Gray and Henry Vandyke Carter, "apothecary-surgeon, microscopist, physician and artist." In her words, "Gray wrote the words, and Carter created the illustrations," and from their collaboration a book was created that has "been in continuous publication ever since 1858."See the full content of this document
Extract
Close Look at an Enduring Textbook
Ms. Richardson writes that "[i]ts publishing history has never been written, so the reasons for its uniqueness are neither properly understood nor appreciated." She has built the narrative of her book focusing on the 1850s,...
See the full content of this document
Sponsored links
