Complete Record - Heirs of Hippocrates No. 1575

ANTOINE FRANCOIS HIPPOLYTE FABRE (1797-1854) Némésis médicale illustrée. Bureau de la Némésis Médicale 1840 Vol. I: xxxii, 278 pp., illus.; Vol. II: 360 pp., illus. 23.9 cm.

Physician, journalist, and poet, Fabre was the son of a Marseilles' physician. He studied medicine at Montpellier and took his medical degree at Paris in 1824. He practiced for some years in Marseilles and then returned to Paris where he taught, practiced, and edited several prestigious medical journals during his career. Fabre wrote this satirical attack on the French medical system in the form of twenty-five long poems, written in rhyming couplets. The author ridicules doctors, medical students, hospitals and clinics, animal magnetism, homeopathy, medical examinations, the French Academy of Sciences, phrenology, midwives, and even the funeral services for Dupuytren (see No. 1323 ff.), although Fabre admired his great achievements. However, Fabre did not always ridicule the physician, for in one of the poems he has Daumier depict a humble and faithful general practitioner who Fabre then contrasts to the specialists, professors, and self-styled leaders of the profession. The book is illustrated by thirty woodcuts together with many smaller vignettes by Honoré Daumier (1808-1879). All of the illustrations are originals by Daumier, drawn especially for this book.

See Related Record(s): 1323

Cited references: Cushing F3 (1841 ed.); Osler 4803; Waller 2876; Wellcome III, p. 2 (Vol. I only)

Gift of John Martin, M.D.