The Sick Rose - The Library of the Uncommons

Hardcover, 256 pages

English language

Published Nov. 14, 2014 by D.A.P..

ISBN:: 978-1-938922-40-4
OCLC Number:: 861673497

(2 reviews)

"The Sick Rose is a visual tour through the golden age of medical illustration. The nineteenth century experienced an explosion of epidemics such as cholera and diphtheria, driven by industrialization, urbanization and poor hygiene. In this pre-color-photography era, accurate images were relied upon to teach students and aid diagnosis. The best examples, featured here, are remarkable pieces of art that attempted to elucidate the mysteries of the body, and the successive onset of each affliction. Bizarre and captivating images, including close-up details and revealing cross-sections, make all too clear the fascinations of both doctors and artists of the time. Barnett illuminates the fears and obsessions of a society gripped by disease, yet slowly coming to understand and combat it. The age also saw the acceptance of vaccination and the germ theory, and notable diagrams that transformed public health, such as John Snow's cholera map and Florence Nightingale's pioneering histograms, are …

"The Sick Rose is a visual tour through the golden age of medical illustration. The nineteenth century experienced an explosion of epidemics such as cholera and diphtheria, driven by industrialization, urbanization and poor hygiene. In this pre-color-photography era, accurate images were relied upon to teach students and aid diagnosis. The best examples, featured here, are remarkable pieces of art that attempted to elucidate the mysteries of the body, and the successive onset of each affliction. Bizarre and captivating images, including close-up details and revealing cross-sections, make all too clear the fascinations of both doctors and artists of the time. Barnett illuminates the fears and obsessions of a society gripped by disease, yet slowly coming to understand and combat it. The age also saw the acceptance of vaccination and the germ theory, and notable diagrams that transformed public health, such as John Snow's cholera map and Florence Nightingale's pioneering histograms, are included and explained. Organized by disease, The Sick Rose ranges from little-known ailments now all but forgotten to the epidemics that shaped the modern age"

1 edition

eishiya reviewed The Sick Rose by Richard Barnett

Beautiful, but not without blemish

4 stars

Like its sequel, Crucial Interventions, the Sick Rose is a beautifully made book showcasing wonderful 19th century illustrations of a macabre topic - diseases, in this case. The printing is crisp, and the book's layout puts the artwork first and foremost. It's a joy to look through, even though the subject matter is far from joyous.

The introduction is a concise history of western medicine, anatomy, and medical illustration. The following chapters, each about a type of disease, describe the early modern history of the illness and its treatment. Having read Crucial Interventions first and expecting a similar disconnect between the text and artwork, I was pleasantly surprised to see the text more closely related to the visuals, and even more so at the fact that the captions for a few of the illustrations went into some detail about the specific case shown.

The book is let down somewhat by …

Like its sequel, Crucial Interventions, the Sick Rose is a beautifully made book showcasing wonderful 19th century illustrations of a macabre topic - diseases, in this case. The printing is crisp, and the book's layout puts the artwork first and foremost. It's a joy to look through, even though the subject matter is far from joyous.

The introduction is a concise history of western medicine, anatomy, and medical illustration. The following chapters, each about a type of disease, describe the early modern history of the illness and its treatment. Having read Crucial Interventions first and expecting a similar disconnect between the text and artwork, I was pleasantly surprised to see the text more closely related to the visuals, and even more so at the fact that the captions for a few of the illustrations went into some detail about the specific case shown.

The book is let down somewhat by spotty citation, and the fact that the index of illustrations is ordered alphabetically by the authors' names rather than by the page number in the book, making it time-consuming to find the credits for a specific illustration.

For artists and writers working with a 19th century setting, I think this should be a good source of inspiration. Illness was everywhere in this era, and while fiction of and about the period often references tuberculosis, gout, and cholera, there was so much more that we might not think of, or dismiss as not visually noticeable. The Sick Rose will expand your visual vocabulary.

grey not grey reviewed The Sick Rose by Richard Barnett

Review of 'The Sick Rose' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Great illustrations but I found it off-putting that instead of titling the illustrations they were all referenced to an index at the back of the book. The same was done with the text. Footnotes would have provided a far better reading experience. Great reproductions though, and very informative.

Subjects

History
Diseases
Pictorial works
Medical illustration

Places

Western Europe