Under the Knife

The thing is, I love historical medicine, so this book is entirely up my alley. Another thing I love is that van de Laar seems as interested in language as I am so he often will indicate the meaning or etymology of medical terms when he brings them up.
Also this is the second book I've read that includes my now-favourite medical history anecdote, of Dr Liston, working before anaesthesia, who could cut with such speed that he once accidentally sliced off the fingers of his assistant, whose massive blood loss caused a spectator to die of shock, and later both the assistant and the patient died from infection, making this the only recorded surgery with a 300% mortality rate.