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DOUGLAS M. HAYNES, Imperial Medicine: Patrick Manson and the Conquest of Tropical Disease. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001. Pp. 229. ISBN 0-8122-3598-3. L26.50, $37.50 (hardback).
In this book Douglas M. Haynes explores the career of Patrick Manson - `the founding father of tropical medicine' - from his formative years in Victorian Scotland, through to his employment as a medical officer in China and his role in establishing the London School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM). There are already several biographies of Manson - some verging on hagiographies - such as that by his protege and sonin-law, P. H. Manson-Bahr. We already know much, therefore, about his pioneering research on malaria parasites and the mosquito vector of filaria, and about his central role in the founding of a new discipline.
Haynes's purpose in this volume is rather different. Manson's career is taken as a case study of the relationship between medicine and empire. Much as Edward Said has argued-in Culture and Imperialism (New York, 1993)-- that the empire lay at the heart of European literature and the arts, Haynes sees it as central to the development of British medicine. This is an interesting point, as the role of empire in the development of medicine has been relatively neglected. The...