Two abstracts...Irish lit you may have missed...

My father (physician, Oslerian and general medical historian) forwarded me two articles the other day and I thought I should pass them along:

The first is "Medicine in the Age of "Ulysses" - James Joyce's portrait of life, medicine, and disease on a Dublin day a century ago" by Fergus Shanahan and Eamonn M.M. Quigley (Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, Vol. 49, No. 2: 276-85pp). The abstract sums it up nicely:

Over time, contemporary writing becomes part of the historical record. In medicine, it is an important learning tool, particularly for understanding the experience and context of disease and illness. Although a century has elapsed since the fictional events on a single day described in James Joyce's Ulysses, the work is still fresh with references and allusions to doctors, illnesses, and the human experience. Ulysses provides perspective on medical and social history and offers a biting commentary of continuing relevance to the doctor-patient relationship.

The other is a bit more off the beaten path. "Oliver St. John Gogarty, MD (1878-1957): Quintessential Irish Literary Renaissance Figure" by Richard Carter (Journal of Medical Biography, 2006, 14: 118-23pp.). The abstract (all articles should have nice, easily cut/pasted, abstracts):

Oliver St John Gogarty (1878-1957) was a quintessential figure of the Irish literary renaissance. He was a successful surgeon, accomplished lyric poet, a man of letters, a senator in the first Irish Free State and a celebrated wit. While pursuing a successful career in ear, nose, and throat (ENT) surgery, Gogarty served a brief, nearly lethal term in politics. He devoted the last several years of his life to a remarkably versatile literary career, the spectrum of his creativity including elegant lyric poetry, autobiographies, biographies, essays, novels and parodies.

Neither is available (easily) online...however, if you drop your friendly, neighborhood medical librarian (all hospitals have them) a quick note and ask nicely, I am confident a copy could be emailed to you with ease (disclosure: my mother is a medical librarian...trust me, they much prefer dealing with nice bookish folk than annoying med. community folk *g*).