Feb. Book: The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly...
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The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine
by Lindsey Fitzharris
The Butchering Art by Lindsey Fitzharris is a historical nonfiction book that details how Joseph Lister revolutionized Victorian surgery by introducing antiseptic techniques, transforming it from a grisly, high-mortality practice into a modern science. The book vividly describes the horrific conditions of 19th-century operating theaters, where speed and brute force were prized over cleanliness, and patients often died from post-operative infections like gangrene and sepsis. Fitzharris chronicles Lister's journey, inspired by Louis Pasteur's germ theory, to apply carbolic acid as a sterilizing agent for wounds, instruments, and hands, ultimately overcoming medical resistance to drastically lower death rates.