The lobotomist
Today the word “lobotomy” evokes images of medical savagery: innocent lives wrecked by experimental procedures and misguided psychiatrists using the insane as guinea pigs. The man behind this controversial surgical procedure, whose tireless advocacy led to 50,000 lobotomies performed in the United States, is the subject of a new biography by Jack El- Hai. The […]
Today the word “lobotomy” evokes images of medical savagery: innocent lives wrecked by experimental procedures and misguided psychiatrists using the insane as guinea pigs. The man behind this controversial surgical procedure, whose tireless advocacy led to 50,000 lobotomies performed in the United States, is the subject of a new biography by Jack El- Hai. The Lobotomist: A Maverick Medical Genius and His Tragic Quest to Rid the World of Mental Illness, from John Wiley & Sons, offers us a picture of the man behind the knife, Dr. Walter Freeman.
THE LOBOTOMIST: A MAVERICK MEDICAL GENIUS AND HIS TRAGIC QUEST TO RID THE WORLD OF MENTAL ILLNESS
Press Contact:
Laurie Brickley
612/823-0724 phone
612/823-0785 fax
Today the word “lobotomy” evokes images of medical savagery: innocent lives wrecked by experimental procedures and misguided psychiatrists using the insane as guinea pigs. The man behind this controversial surgical procedure, whose tireless advocacy led to 50,000 lobotomies performed in the United States, is the subject of a new biography by Jack El- Hai. The Lobotomist: A Maverick Medical Genius and His Tragic Quest to Rid the World of Mental Illness, from John Wiley & Sons, offers us a picture of the man behind the knife, Dr. Walter Freeman.
Rosemary Kennedy�s recent death (she was a patient of Dr. Freeman) has drawn attention to the subject of lobotomy. In addition, the FDA recently gave preliminary approval to a surgically implanted device that will treat chronic depression through the electrical stimulation of the vagus nerve in the brain �an interesting development in light of the historical context of lobotomy and psychosurgery.
The Lobotomist will be of special interest to your readers � especially those drawn to biography, history, and medical science. I am happy to send you a review copy and/or to arrange an interview with Jack El-Hai.
The Lobotomist has received the following stories and reviews:
� An interview with Terry Gross recently aired on NPR’s Fresh Air (March 10). To listen, click on the link below:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4529662
� William Grimes of The New York Times featured the book on January 26;
� Playboy will feature the book in its April issue;
� Discover magazine featured a review in the March issue;
� Scientific American Mind will run a review in its May issue;
� The New England Journal of Medicine. the British Medical Journal, Nature Neuroscience and New Scientist will feature The Lobotomist in upcoming issues;
� In May, National Public Radio will air a documentary about Walter Freeman�s lobotomy patients, a production inspired by the book;
� The New York Times, The Washington Post, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Chicago Sun-Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the Ottawa Citizen, the Newark Star-Ledger, the San Jose Mercury News, the Denver Post and the St. Paul Pioneer Press are just a few of the newspapers that have already featured the book or will publish articles and reviews in the coming weeks.
ABOUT THE BOOK:
El-Hai, who began researching Freeman’s life in 1996, grew interested in the psychosurgeon’s career when he heard the story of a lobotomy demonstration Freeman gave at a state hospital in Minnesota, one of many such displays of his skills he made during the 1940s and ’50s. Before starting on his book, El-Hai won the June Roth Memorial Award for Medical Journalism, given annually by the American Society of Journalists and Authors, for his article about Freeman in The Washington Post Magazine. The Lobotomist is the result of El-Hai’s examination of thousands of letters, reports, and medical records among Freeman’s papers at George Washington University, as well as interviews with Freeman’s three living children.
He has assembled in The Lobotomist a portrait that is much different from Freeman’s image today as a monstrous and even criminal physician – that of a brilliant doctor, determined to develop a treatment for seemingly hopeless mental patients, whose many flaws drove him to continue using a promising procedure much longer than he should have. Some patients benefited from lobotomy, and some did not. El-Hai discovered that a few of Freeman’s lobotomy patients continued their careers as musicians, physicians, and teachers; that Freeman was nearly put in charge of a project to lobotomize scores of African American patients at a Veterans Hospital in Tuskegee, Alabama; that he once operated on more than 200 patients during a two-week stretch in West Virginia; and that he was widely considered one of the leading neurologists and psychiatrists of his generation.
Praise for The Lobotomist: A Maverick Medical Genius and His Tragic Quest to Rid the World of Mental Illness by Jack El-Hai
�In The Lobotomist, Jack El-Hai�s lively biography, Freeman comes across as a classic American type, a do-gooder and a go-getter with a bit of the huckster thrown in.� William Grimes, The New York Times
“A first class biography�a fascinating book of impeccable research and disquieting details� an absorbing, unsettling and cautionary story.” Cleveland Plain-Dealer
�A moving portrait of failed greatness� El-Hai’s book succeeds as both an empathetic, nuanced portrait of one of America’s most complex public figures and as a record of the cultural shifts that have occurred in the treatment of mental illness over the last century.� Publishers Weekly
�El-Hai deftly chronicles the rise and fall of Freeman and the procedure he championed. A worthy purchase for any library, especially for medical and large public libraries.� Library Journal
�Relying heavily upon Freeman’s notes, letters, and journals, El-Hai reconstructs the life of a man whose main mission, aside from personal glory, was to help the helpless� Driven, egotistical, brilliant, and focused, Freeman is as fascinating as the chronicle of twentieth-century psychiatry in which El-Hai sets his story.� Donna Chavez, Booklist
“This captivating book chronicles the life of a man who brought showmanship to science and touched the grey matter of a generation of mentally ill patients� No history of modern psychiatry is complete without this story.” Andrew Solomon, author of The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression
“The moment Walter Freeman’s gaze lands on an ice pick in his kitchen drawer; you know you’re in for a rollicking ride� Impressively researched and even-handed, El-Hai’s book unravels the man inside the monster. ” Mary Roach, author of Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers
“Who would predict that a book about a brutal, discredited brain operation could be such fun? But The Lobotomist IS fun… Jack El-Hai has done a masterful job of bringing to life a brilliant, slightly cruel, wholly original scientist whose contribution to the treatment of mental illness has too long been misunderstood.� Robin Marantz, author of Pandora’s Baby: How the First Test Tube Babies Sparked the Reproductive Revolution
Thanks for your interest. If you have any questions or would like more information, please don’t hesitate to contact me.
Laurie Brickley
612/823-0724 phone
612/823-0785 fax
brickley@goldengate.net
