Deborah Hayden - Pox: Genius, Madness, and the Mysteries of Syphilis

Praise for POX

In POX the author posits who among those still known to us might have had syphilis. This well-researched book is welcome."

George E. Ehrlich, MD,
JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association

Abraham Lincoln, Adolf Hitler, Friedrich Nietzsche, Oscar Wilde, Ludwig van Beethoven, Vincent van Gogh,many noted historical figures have joined the furtive queue at the STD clinic. So claimsDeborah Hayden, shining a light on the dark secrets of 14 famous names from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

John Bonner, New Scientist

Haydens carefully researched book is destined to become a classic of short biography in the newly emerging field of medical symbiotics.

Lynn Margulis, author of
Acquiring Genomes: A Theory of the Origins of the Species

This fluently written book makes for an engaging read.

Edward Shorter, MD, Nature Medicine

often fascinatinglike poring through peoples lives with a microscope.

Dallas Morning News

morbidly fascinating historical profile.

Kirkus Reviews

Hayden pulls together fascinating medical histories. Her arguments are sure to provoke debate.

Publishers Weekly

a fascinating accountany book that combines genius, madness, sex, and disease is bound to find an audience.

Library Journal

POX breaks new ground in the fields of medical history and biography. Hayden presents 15 historical celebrities, including Beethoven, Nietzsche, Lincoln, and her pice de rsistance, Hitler.

Peter Byrne, San Francisco Weekly

Is it possible for a book to be too entertaining?

South Florida Sun Sentinel

Deborah Hayden attempts to put words to the unmentionable, pursuing a disease whose most recognizable attribute is that it cant be recognized.

Bookforum

provocative and controversial

The Tennessean

A good read for anyone who loves a skillfully guided tour through a new, important and fascinating subject. It combines original thinking with smooth narrative. Two thumbs up!

Thomas P. Lowry, MD, The Free Lance Star

Hayden has written vividly and with clarity about the nature of the disease. In each of her cases she has convincingly, to this non-medical reader, demonstrated the validity of her suggested diagnoses.

Oscholars: The Internet Journal of Oscar Wilde News

POX is a bombshell that blows open the question of the place of syphilis in the highest reaches of history.

Rudolph Binion, author of Hitler Among the Germans

In a world filled with the fear of AIDS and SARS and in a culture fascinated with Hollywoods version of the forensic sciences, POX is a curious, compelling read.

Times Union

Deborah Hayden has combined a talent for explaining complicated medical studies with a historians determination to force the privacy of the past in writing a most valuable book.

Baton Rouge Advocate

A unique historical perspective for the current epidemic of AIDS.

Whole Earth Magazine

Deborah Hayden is a genuinely original thinker and a beautifully lucid writer.

William Schaberg, author of The Nietzsche Canon

A tour de force that will make readers recognize the impact infectious diseases have on individuals, society, now and throughout history.

Norbert Hirschhorn, MD, Yale University School of Medicine

An extraordinary journey with the spirochete through the lives and works of some of historys most famous and infamous characters. Hayden is not afraid of traveling through unchartered and dangerous terrain.

Ashley Robins, MD, University of Cape Town, South Africa

DEBORAH HAYDEN

A Member of the Perseus Books Group

New York

Chapter 19: The 4 lines of poetry on page 240 from a letter of Oliver St. John Gogarty to J. Joyce are reprinted here with the courtesy of Colin Smythe Ltd. on behalf of the heirs to the Gogarty Estate.

Copyright 2003 by Deborah Hayden

Hardcover edition first published in 2003 by Basic Books,

A Member of the Perseus Books Group

Paperback edition first published in 2004 by Basic Books

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, address Basic Books, 387 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 100168810.

Designed by Trish Wilkinson

Set in 12.5-point Bembo by the Perseus Books Group

Library of Congress catalogued the hardcover as follows:

Hayden, Deborah.

Pox : genius, madness, and the mysteries of syphilis / Deborah Hayden.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN: 978-0-7867-2413-0

1. SyphilisHistory.I. Title.

RC201.47 .H39 2003

615.95'13'009dc21

2002015847

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

To Rudy Binion

Dear friend, ferocious editor

A zest in the ferreting out of the obscure, a positively detective zeal in the running to earth of this most subtle master of the dissembling art, that is the foremost asset of the clinical syphilologist.

John H. Stokes, Modern Clinical Syphilology

a sensation, touch the spot under the covers, hard like a button beneath the skin, but that was weeks ago, soft skin, maybe, yes, but the risk the terrible risk, a glass of steaming absinthe the glowing green muse, and now this blossom unfolds like a flower on a cactus stalk. bathe it in the water of the narcissus, they say. then gentle bumps everywhere, the soles of the feet, palms of the hand, a rash pale as a sweet rose. the doctor says yes, finally yes, it is the pox, the splendid pox of columbus, fruit of the new world, horror. no one must know, i will quarantine myself like a leper. such pain. my throat, and deep in the bones, fever, is this typhoid? malaria? its like being bound hand and foot at the bottom of a deep dark well. no food, no hunger. fear. white moss in the mouth. must not kiss. must never kiss. sweet thick hair falls to the floor, gleaming patches of scalp in the candlelight. i whisper this disease to a friend, give it a name, but in the dark, please, please dont tell. the horror of life. the rash goes away, and the fever. the cactus flower withers, shrinks to a small scar. cured, yes i am cured.