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Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything
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Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything Hardcover - 2017 - 1st Edition

by Lydia Kang; Nate Pedersen


From the publisher

What won't we try in our quest for perfect health, beauty, and the fountain of youth? Well, just imagine a time when doctors prescribed morphine for crying infants. When liquefied gold was touted as immortality in a glass. And when strychnine--yes, that strychnine, the one used in rat poison--was dosed like Viagra. Looking back with fascination, horror, and not a little dash of dark, knowing humor, Quackery recounts the lively, at times unbelievable, history of medical misfires and malpractices. Ranging from the merely weird to the outright dangerous, here are dozens of outlandish, morbidly hilarious "treatments"--conceived by doctors and scientists, by spiritualists and snake oil salesmen (yes, they literally tried to sell snake oil)--that were predicated on a range of cluelessness, trial and error, and straight-up scams. With vintage illustrations, photographs, and advertisements throughout, Quackery seamlessly combines macabre humor with science and storytelling to reveal an important and disturbing side of the ever-evolving field of medicine.

Details

  • Title Quackery: A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything
  • Author Lydia Kang; Nate Pedersen
  • Binding Hardcover
  • Edition number 1st
  • Edition 1
  • Pages 352
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Workman Publishing
  • Date 2017-10-17
  • Illustrated Yes
  • ISBN 9780761189817 / 0761189815
  • Weight 1.55 lbs (0.70 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.1 x 6.2 x 1.1 in (20.57 x 15.75 x 2.79 cm)
  • Library of Congress subjects Medicine - History, Quacks and quackery - History
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 2017044778
  • Dewey Decimal Code 615.856

Media reviews

Citations

  • Choice, 07/01/2018, Page 0
  • Publishers Weekly, 07/17/2017, Page 0

About the author

Lydia Kang, MD, is a practicing internal medicine physician and author of young adult fiction and adult fiction. Her YA novels include Control, Catalyst, and the upcoming The November Girl. Her adult fiction debut is entitled A Beautiful Poison. Her nonfiction has been published in JAMA, the Annals of Internal Medicine, and the Journal of General Internal Medicine. This author is represented by the Hachette Speakers Bureau.
Nate Pedersen is a librarian, historian, and freelance journalist with over 400 publications in print and online, including in the Guardian, the Believer, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Art of Manliness.
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