The Anatomist - Bill Hayes [82]
“All my fellow students, and most since my time, have left the School and are settled in life,” he observes on another date. “Whenever I hear of their advancement, or meet them, [these] active men, there is a kind of stunning sensation or pang in one’s breast—and the same kind of feeling on seeing the younger students emerge into grown manly fellows.” Indeed, as Carter notes, the very pupils he had been teaching would be his competitors for the same jobs and, because of their youth, perhaps have an edge. The thought is almost too depressing for him to contemplate. What never occurs to him, ironically, and never would, is that the bane of his current existence—drawing—would end up making his name. For the moment, all he can think about is bringing this “quiet mechanical occupation” to a close and putting the anatomy book behind him.
And what about the author? During the same month, as Carter wallowed in his “languid state,” was Henry Gray over at 8 Wilton Street burning the midnight oil, finishing the last chapters of the book? Was the undertaking taking its toll on Gray as well?
Maybe.
Upon receiving Keith Nicol’s chronology, I turn at once to the year 1857, hoping for a revelation. There is none. Alas, Keith had not discovered a cache of Gray’s papers, a diary, or anything of the kind. In fact, Keith later tells me, he had found almost nothing about Gray’s personality or personal life during his research. Keith did, however, track down a small collection of letters written to Henry Gray (now in the possession of a distant relative). In these, a curious fact emerged. At the end of May 1857, Gray took a six-month leave of absence from St. George’s, during which he served as personal physician to George Granville Sutherland-Leveson-Gower, the second Duke of Sutherland, a seventy-one-year-old nobleman whose London home was a quick brougham ride away. The correspondence gives no hint as to why Gray would take this job, but to me, there’s an obvious explanation. It was not for money or prestige or the chance to rub elbows with royalty—granted, all nice inducements. No, to echo the two Henrys’ guiding principle, it was for practicality’s sake. With the Duke of Sutherland, Gray would have just one patient (the duke lived four more years, so I suspect his demands on the doctor were not extravagant), and this arrangement would give Gray the one thing he needed most: extra time. Freed of his usual responsibilities, he could bring his manuscript, at long last, to its end.
I HAD NEVER heard a single unflattering word said of Henry Gray. Then I spoke with Charlie Ordahl.
“Over the past couple centuries, anatomists like Gray have been like the monks of the Catholic church, re-creating the same illuminated manuscript,” he tells me after lab one day. Dr. Ordahl—“Charlie, please”—is one of the eight anatomy instructors. “It’s the whole scribe-type tradition,” he continues. “Very honorable. But that mentality is what makes anatomy as a science such a failure. Nothing changes, decade after decade. Textbooks are the same. It’s taught in the same way—with cadavers, all on-the-table, same position. The same memorizing in the same order of all these parts you’re never going to see again.”
Little did I expect that the mere sight of my copy of Gray’s Anatomy would provoke such a prompt mounting of a soapbox. But Charlie can stand on the book itself if he desires. I am quite enjoying his diatribe. “So, why do you think that is?” I ask, urging him on. “Why has nothing changed?”
“Well, it’s partly the power