It was interesting to me to read this book so soon after I read Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain, as both books are set in the same era (early twentieth century, in the lead up to the war) and cover similar fields (medicine – although while The Magic Mountain had doctors floundering in the field of tuberculosis, without the benefit of modern understanding and equipment, in this book the field of study is disorders of the mind).
The two main characters came to ‘mad doctoring’ from very different backgrounds – Jacques was the son of a poor French farmer whose brother was kept chained up in the stables because he suffered from what we would now call severe schizophrenia. Jacques intelligence was nurtured by a local priest who enabled him to study and follow his dream to help his brother and others like him.
Thomas was from an upper-class English family, and as the younger son was expected to train for some respectable profession. His interest lay in literature, especially Shakespeare which led him to wondering how our minds evolved to create art which led him to studying the brain and it’s disorders.
There was a lot of interesting information about the history of this field of medicine, and vivid portraits of the horrors of the early asylums which I found fascinating. As a story though, I felt the characters were somewhat lost behind the weight of the historic setting and although I found the book interesting (if a little over long), I wasn’t that invested in the people at the heart of the story (the ending did move me though).
Sarah Wray Writer 