Bedlam, or Bethlehem Hospital, was a place of horror both for the mentally ill people incarcerated there and in the minds of others, not just in London. By the 17th century, visitors were paying to view the ‘lunaticks’ in Bedlam, plays were being written about it, and fear of imprisonment there was commonplace, Jemahl Evans, […]
Building better humans? Eugenics and history
Louise Fein looks at the lessons to be learned about altering human genetics in the light of the history of eugenics, the chilling theory that lies behind her latest novel, The Hidden Child. I recently heard a news clip about how human cells have been successfully grown in monkey embryos in a laboratory. The concept […]
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, mental health pioneer
It’s hard to be more historical and contemporary in these days of Covid jabs than this past month, when two important anniversaries in the history of immunisation against serious contagions have taken place. In April 1721 Lady Mary Wortley Montagu inoculated her daughter, Mary, with smallpox, but although the little girl survived, inoculation wasn’t widely […]