SILVER WIRE BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR SPIRAL BOUND READERS

Guy deChauliac gave detailed instructions on suturing techniques
in his Major Surgery (1363). I wonder if Guy had heard of or tasted bananas .

Hello! This blog post is for those of you interested the research involved in writing and drawing Silver Wire, an illustrated story of sutures and sewing, which you can find online at Spiral Bound. 

Because Silver Wireexplores some very sensitive topics like research ethics and the medical histories of enslaved people, women, and the “fathers” of medicine, I think it’s important to show my some of the research for the text and visual references that went into the drawing and images. 

In the comic, I list pages and panel numbers with citations and a bibliography. But here, you’re only getting the bibliography. Why? Because they are both so friggin’ long! It is likely you will give up from exhaustion before getting half way through the bibliography! The citations list includes wry commentary and references to artists and other thinkers who influenced the work. If you are a glutton for research (or punishment), you can buy the minicomic. The comic also has images of some of my medically themed embroidery, and I’ve included some of them here along with select panels from the comic. Pictures make everything better!

A diagram of venous ligatures from 
Bernard and Huette. Printed
on fabric and worked up with
darning stitch used in Blackwork
embroidery. Plus some cross stitch.

If you just want to know where you can find information and images about the history of medicine, and don’t care that much about a list of books or references, try the following sites -- 

Many of the books and images used in the research for making Silver Wire can be found through the New York Academy of Medicine Library Historical Collection from their online collections and at their reading room. Browse their database and make an appointment - they are open to the public! 

The National Library of Medicine Digital Collection is a wondrous site! 

Archive.org is an excellent resource for pdfs of historical surgical texts, not to mention documentation of practically everything in all media.

I find the Wellcome Collection image search is a little difficult to maneuver through, but persistence will pay off! 

Bibliography

Annan & Sons, T.R. Joseph Lister, Baron Lister. Wellcome Collection, Glasgow.

Ashenden. Diorama of Listerian Operation . Image via Wellcome Collection.

Bauer and Black.Ligatures and sutures. Chicago: Bauer and Black, 1924?

Bell, Charles 1774-1842. Illustrations of the great operations of surgery : trepan, hernia, amputation, aneurism, and lithotomy. London: Longman, 1821.

Bell, John (1763-1820). The Principles of Surgery. Edinburgh: Printed for T. Cadell, and W. Davies, in the Strand, T.N. Longman & O. Rees, Paternoster Row, London; and W. Creech, P. Hill, and Manners and Miller, 1801-08.

Bell, John. Discourses on the nature and cure of wounds. I. Of generals. Of procuring adhesion. Of wounded arteries. Of gunshot wounds. Of the medical treatment of wounds. II. Of particulars. Of wounds of the breast. Of wounds of the belly. Of wounds of the head. Of wounds of the throat. III. Of dangerous wounds of the limbs. Of the question of amputation ... . Edinburgh: Bell and Bradfute, 1795.

Bernard, Claude, et al. Illustrated manual of operative surgery and surgical anatomy / by Ch. Bernard and Ch. Huette ; edited, with notes and additions, and adapted to the use of the American medical student, by W. H. Van Buren and C. E. Isaacs ; illustrated ... by M.J. Lévillé. New York: H. Balliere, 1855.

In 1626 Adriaan van Spiegel and Giulio Casseri (posthumously) published a book
on fetal development, depicting images of pregnant women standing in nature, their genitals discreetly masked by foliage. Their abdomens and uterine walls are peeled back like flower petals. I used silk, antique lace, bad-, darning-, and satin stitches on this women-are-flowers theme.

Bliquez, Lawrence J. and Ralph Jackson. Roman surgical instruments and other minor objects in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples: with a catalogue of the surgical instruments in the "Antiquarium" at Pompeii. Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 1994.

Board, Ernest. Robert Liston Operating. Wellcome Library, London.

Bock, Carle Ernst, 1809-1874. Atlas of human anatomy : with explanatory text . Wellcome Collection Images: https://wellcome collection.org/works/yu9nrqxq , n.d.

Boyer, Paul S. and Clifford E. Junior Clark. “Textbook Site for: The Enduring Vision, Fifth Edition, Technology and cultrue: Chaper 18.” n.d. Cengage Learning.2018  23-July. <http://college.cengage.com/ history/us/boyer/enduring_vision/ 5e/students/techcult/ch18.html>.

Breastcancer.org.Mastectomy: What to expect. 2018 йил 21-February. 2018 11-June. <http://www.breastcancer.org/treatment/surgery/mastectomy/expectations>.

Brunshcwig, Hieronymus (ca. 1450-ca. 1512). Liber de arte distillandi de compositis. Strassburg: Johann Gruninger, 1512.

Burch, Jon M., et al. “Single-Layer Continuous Versus Two-Layer Interrupted Intestinal Anastomosis A Prospective Randomized Trial.” Annals of Surgery231.6 (2000): 832-837.

Chartran, Théobald. Ambroise Paré using a ligature on an artery of an amputated leg of a soldier, during the Siege of Metz, 1553. Wellcome Collection.

Cheselden, William (1688-1752). Osteographia, or The anatomy of the bones. London: William Bowyer, 1733.

Colton, Virginia (ed.). Reader's Digest Complete Guide to Needlework. Pleasantville, New York/Montreal: Reader's Digest, 1979.

deBeche-Adams, Teresa H. and Jaime L. Bohl. “Rectovaginal Fisturals.” Clinics in Colon and Rectal Surgery23.2 (2010): 99-103.

Ethicon. "Ethicon Wound Closure Manual." 2005. Penn Medicine.Johnson and Johnson. 8 January 2019. <http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/surgery/Education/facilities/measey/Wound_Closure_Manual.pdf>.

Fandre, A. Le catgut, les ligatures et les sutures chirurgicales à travers les âges, préface du professeur Louis Bruntz ...Paris: Masson et cie, 1944.

Galen. Method of Medicine, Books 5-9. Ed. Ian Johnston and G.H.R. Horsley. Trans. Ian Johnston and G.H.R. Horsley. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011.

I didn't plan on returning to Galen as often as I did during my residency but the guy
is magnetic. What a showman! 

Gilbert, C. Galen treating wounded gladiator in coliseum of Pergamon, 2nd century. Getty Images. Know Yourself, Notions of physology to youth and educated people by Louis Figuier. 1883.

Guy, de Chauliac and E. Nicaise. The Major Surgery of Guy de Chauliac. Trans. Leonard D. Rosenman. Xlibris corporation, 1363, 1890, 2005.

Guy, de Chauliac and Leonard D. Rosenman. The major surgery of Guy de Chauliac : An English Translation. Ed. Translation of Nicaise. Trans. Edouard Nicaise and Leonard D. Rosenman. Philadelphia: Xlibris Corporation, 2007.

Heath, William, 1795-1840. Wellington and Peel in the roles of the body-snatchers Burke and Hare suffocating Mrs Docherty for sale to Dr. Knox; representing the extinguishing by Wellington and Peel of the Constitution of 1688 by Catholic Emancipation.Wellcome Collection.

Hinckley, Robert Cutler. Robert Cutler Hinckley - “Ether Day, or The First Operation with Ether” - Wikipedia.org. n.d. 5 October 2018.

Hunt, Tony and Frugardo, 12th cent. Ruggero. The medieval surgery / [commentary on the illustrations by] Tony Hunt. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 1992.

Johnson and Johnson, Inc. Lister and the ligature, a landmark in the history of modern surgery, compiled by the research readers of the Scientific Department. New Brunswick: Johnson & Johnson, 1925.

Li, Guo-Cai, et al. “Single‑layer continuous suture contributes to the reduction of surgical complications in digestive tract anastomosis involving special anatomical locations.” Molecular and Clinical Oncology2 (2014): 159-164.

Mackenzie, David. The History of Sutures. Paper. The Scottish Society of the History of Medicine. Edinburgh: The Scottish Society of the History of Medicine, 1971.

Madden, John L.Technical Considerations in Gastrointestinal Surgery. Somerville: Ethicon, 1973.

Manigaud, C. Ambroise Paré (1517-1590). Wellcome Collection: Images.

Mattern, Susan P. The Prince of Medicine: Galen in the Roman Empire. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013.

An oophorectomy is the surgical removal of an ovary. This uterus, worked up in yarn on a thrift store doily, is stitched with the same darning  stitches as the Bernard  and Huette arm, above. I pulled and yanked on the yarn where the right ovary should be, to resemble the tugging of scar tissue.

Medford, Samuel. Father, Mother, and Boy. Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Milne, John Stewart. Surgical Instruments in Greek and Roman Times. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1907.

Nicaise, E. The major surgery of Guy de Chauliac : surgeon and master in medicine of the University of Montpelier : written in 1363, here re-edited and collated from Latin and French editions and complemented with illustrations, supplemented with notes and an historical introduction about the Middle Ages and the life and the works of Guy de Chauliac. Trans. Leonard D. Rosenman. Philadelphia: Xlibris Corporation, 2007.

NIH: US National Library of Medicine. Cesarean Section - A Brief History: Part 1 - Cesarean section performed on a living woman by a female practitioner. Miniature from a fourteenth-century "Historie Ancienne.". 27 April 1998. January 2019. <https://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/cesarean/part1.html>.

Ogden, Margaret S. The cyrurgie of Guy de Chauliac. London, New York: Society by the Oxford University Press, 1971.

Ojanuga, Durrenda. “The medical ethics of the 'Father of Gynaecology', Dr J Marion Sims.” Journal of medical ethics19 (1993): 28-31.

Paré, Ambroise (1510-1590) and Francis R. (1870-1950) Packard. Life and times of Ambroise Paré <1510-1590> with a new translation of his Apology and an account of his journeys in divers places, by Francis R. Packard ... with twenty-two text illustrations, twenty-seven full page plates and two folded maps of Paris of the 16th and 17th centuries. . New York: P.B. Hoeber, 1921.

Paré, Ambroise.Dix livres de la chirurgie : avec le magasin des instrumens necessaires à icelle / par Ambroise Paré. (1510?-1590). Paris: Cercle du Livre Précieux, 1564.

—. Ten Books of Surgery with The Magazine of Instruments Necessary for It Translated by Robert White Linker and Nathan Womack. Trans. Robert White Linker and Nathan Womack. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1969.

—. The Workes of that famous Chirurgion Ambrose Parey Translated out of Latine and compared with the French.Trans. Th: Johnson. London: Th:Cotes and R. Young, 1634.

Parker, Rozsika. The Subversive Stitch: Embroidery and the Making of the Feminine. London: Women's Press, 1984.

This is a representation of historical research subjects.
The pig is making a sarcastic statement.

Planella Coromina, Josep or Jose (1804-90). "Galen assisting a gladiator, wounded in the circus of Bergamo." n.d. bridgemanimages.com.14 October 2018.

Porter, Roy. The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of Humanity. New York: W. W. Norton, 1997.

Queen Victoria visiting the Royal Infirmary, Edinurgh. Wellcome Collection. The Illustrated London News and Sketch Ltd.London, England, 1842.

Richardson, Ruth. Death, Dissection and the Destitute. London: Penguin, 1988.

Rose, H.F. Galen, standing in a glade, looks at a human skeleton on the ground. Wellcome Collection.

Ruysch, Frederik (1638-1731). Opera omnia anatomico-medico-chirurgica : huc usque edita. Quorum elenchus pagina sequenti exhibetur, cum figuris aeneis. . Amsterdam: Apud Janssonio-Waesbergios, 1702-1731.

Salazar, Christine F. The Treatment of War Wounds in Graeco-Roman Antiquity. Boston: Brill, 2000.

Savage, Henry. The surgery, surgical pathology and surgical anatomy of the female pelvic organs : in a series of coloured plates taken from nature, with commentaries, notes and cases . 3d. Philadelphia: LInday and Blakiston, 1876.

Sims, J. Marion 1813-1883. On the treatment of vesico-vaginal fistula. Philadelphia: Blanchard & Lea, 1853.

—. Silver Sutures in Surgery. New York: Wood, 1858.

This is a lace curtain worked over in wool, linen,
and cotton floss. The image is from a gynecological
surgery book by Henry Savage, demonstrating the
Sims Position for gynecological surgeries.
The floral pattern on thecurtain looked amazingly like a uterus.

Sims, J. Marion. The Story of My Life. New York: Da Cap Press, 1968.

Smellie, William. An abridgement of the practice of midwifery: and a set of anatomical tables with explanations. Collected from the works of the celebrated, W. Smellie, M.D.  . Boston: J. Norman, 1786.

Spiegel, Adriaan van (1578-1625) and Giulio (ca. 1552-1616) Casseri. De formato foetu liber singularis. Padua: Io. Bap. de Martinis and Livius Pasquatus, 1626.

Stamatakos, Michael, et al. “Vesicovaginal Fistula: Diagnosis and Management.” The Indian Journal of Surgery76.2 (2012): 131-136. 2018 йил 2-July. <https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/
           PMC4039689/>.

Thom, Robert. Sims with Anarcha. Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, Pearson Museum.

Unknown. "Harriet Tubman." n.d. Wikipedia.5 October 2018. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
          Harriet_Tubman>.

Van Gogh, Vincent. Female Nude, Back View. 
           Accessed via Wikimedia Commons, 9/21/18. Reprography from art book. Paris, 1887.

Vauguion, de La. A compleat body of chirurgical operations : containing the whole practice of surgery ... Faithfully done into English.London: Henry Bonwick, T. Goodwin, M Wotton, B. Took, and S. Manship, 1699.

Wall, LL. “The medical ethics of Dr. J Marion Sims: as fresh look at the historical record.”Journal of Medical Ethics32 (2006): 346-350.

Whaley, Leigh Ann. Women and the practice of medical care in early modern Europe, 1400-1800. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire ; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.

Wikimedia Commons File: John Bell from MPG.jpg. circa 1801. <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:John_Bell_from_NPG.jpg>.

Ziegler, Paul F. Textbook On Sutures. 2nd Edition. Chicago: The Kendall Company, 1942.

Three Cheers for You! I can’t believe you made it through this thing!

SPX 2017 COMICS DEBUT - STITCHIN' TIME!

NEWEST MINICOMIC

How do I process research as I work on a large project? By making small snippets to help me process narrative priorities, explore media, and transform vast amounts of data into digestible pieces. One of these pieces has been transformed into my mini comic, Stitchin' Time!

Was Galen really bossy? Maybe not, but historians 

consider him a bit of a "showman." 

(Buy the book if you want this citation! - I am shameless!)

Stitchin' Time! is a ridiculous historical fiction based on factual medical history. Aulus Cornelius Celsus (c. 25 BCE – c. 50 CE) was a Roman writer of De Medicina, an important medical text.  Aelius (or Claudius) Galenus (129  – c. 200 CE) was a famous surgeon and one of the most influential writers in the history of medicine. In this minicomic, for the first time ever, Celsus and Galen team up to stitch a disemboweled gladiator back together! Could these men have ever met? Heck no! Would this type of surgery have taken place in the 2^nd century? Heck yes!

Yes, Celsus wrote about a double-handed suture! 

Who needs robotic surgery when you can get so fancy with a needle?

RIGOROUS RESEARCH

Yeah, it's a pretty silly story and I'm giving you links in this post to Wikipedia, but the historical research is sound! This is the first comic resulting directly from my residency at the New York Academy of Medicine Library. There are notes about each panel and a citations list at the back. You don't have to read them if you don't want to, but they may help you get a joke or two.

A surgery panel inspired by a 17th century anatomical 

illustration from the Academy Library Historical Collection.

SPX TABLE H13A

The mini will be debuting at the Small Press Expo in Bethesda Maryland, September 15-16.

OTHER PLACES TO BUY
After SPX you will be able to purchase this tome (and more!) at Birdcage Bottom Books.

NEW YORK ACADEMY OF MEDICINE ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE

BEST SUMMER, EVER! (Next to the time I went to Paris for my birthday.)

Le Catgut! Guess what it's about!

(Catgut is made from sheep intestine, BTW.)

You know why this is such a great summer? Because I am spending it reading centuries-old books on the topics of sutures, ligatures, and the materials they were made from. And then I use what I've learned as inspiration for embroidery, drawing, comics, and writing. 

HOW DID I GET HERE?
A few artists have asked me how I became A.I.R. at the Academy Library's Historical Collection. The joking answer is that I haunted the library so much that it was easier to make me official than to charge me with loitering. But this statement is also partially true (not the the not the charging me with a crime part). The Academy is this incredible vault of treasure and I have been mining it for years. The best part is that anyone can mine it. Before becoming A.I.R. I got to know the Collection and the staff at the Academy through research and by attending (and presenting at) some of the great programming there.

PAST PROJECTS AT THE ACADEMY
My first presentation was at the Academy's Vesalius 500 celebration doing what I do best, blathering on about anatomy. I also drew on a live model using the 16th century anatomist Vesalius' illustration as reference material.

For more about drawing on the body see this post.

Shortly after that I used the collection to assist in the adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's The Body Snatcher. The story takes place in 1830's Edinburgh around the time that the anatomist, Knox had hired the infamous Burke and Hare. The incredible (librarian) Arlene Shaner found books and articles from Edinburgh published at the time; dissection textbooks written and illustrated by two Edinburgh brother (John and Charles Bell) from the late 17- and early 1800's; and visual reference for anatomy theaters and labs. My version of the story spends a little more time at dissecting than the original. It will be published in the Seven Stories Press' Graphic Canon:Crime series. I don't know whether it is in volume one (coming this fall) or volume two (to follow).

A page from my EC Horror Comic-inspired version of 

R.L. Stevenson's The Body Snatcher.

I just finished teaching my second Visualizing and Drawing Anatomy workshops using the Library's collections and live models. You can read more about the workshops here, and here.

CURENT RESEARCH
I enjoy exploring medical history and I enjoy researching needlework so why not do both? To that end I'm studying the history of sutures and ligatures, which is sewing, after all. Galen's* instruction on stitching up the body was my earliest area of focus. Then I went on to read the "Major Surgery" of the French medieval surgeon Guy de Chauliac*, published in 1363. From there I am staying in France to read the works of Ambrose Paré*.  After him I will continue on to Edinburgh and John Bell*, and then... we shall see!

What I see at my desk. 

I am using illustrations from the collection to experiment with 

different methods of depicting these images on various fabrics.

For each surgeon I'm reading biographical information, background on the general state of medicine in that time, and works by that surgeon (or their translations). I'm also researching modes of production of the materials for making stitches such as flax, silk, catgut, etc. Additionally, I'm doing some reading regarding gender roles in textile production and gender roles in medicine over the centuries. To my surprise there are even books that discuss textile production during different eras! I'm also pouring over visual reference from the Library's collection as well as sources from the nefarious internet when I've come to a research impasse or just need a quick fix. 

Ultimately all this data and inspiration will coalesce into a graphic narrative, much of which I hope to render in (you guessed it!) needlework.

*Yes, I'm giving you their Wikipedia links. For more interesting information about these people, visit the Academy Library!

I LOVE RESEARCH

INSPIRATION
Research doesn't have to be rigorous to bring about interesting results. Sometimes I like to do what I call "passive research" and read interesting articles or browse websites or go through historical anatomical illustrations when I'm taking a break from something grueling (like grading exams). One of my favorite sites is a National Library of Medicine site called Historical Anatomies On The Web and one of my favorite collections of illustrations is by two anatomists named Spiegel and Casseri. Casseri's illustrations show cadavers in downright flirtatious poses as they reveal their parts is burlesque-ish fashion.

One of my favorite poses. 

This subject is making a real show of his serratus anterior muscle.

The way these bodies are set in an environment, interacting with their world, and (in this case) acknowledging the viewer. Inspired me to make some "anatomy" comics in the same theme.

Pictorial Anatomy of the Cute does with adorable kittens what Casseri did with human beings, but kittens are cuter. To make this mini comic I had to study cat anatomy and comparative anatomy, too.

 Pictures in the mini comic are grayscale, but the colors are cuter.

This picture from "The World Is Not Enough" is a reference to another historical anatomical illustration done by the anatomist Bernhard Siegfried Albinus and his artist Jan Wandelaar. "The Anatomy Of 007" takes the anatomized body interacting with its environment to a whole new level. It also meant getting out a lot of visual anatomical reference, which is also research.

I see an uncanny resemblance between Pierce Brosnan's pose, above, 

and the lateral view of Albinus and Wandelaar's cadaver, below.

DEEPER
One day while browsing Hecktoen International I came upon an article about Marin Marais, an 18th century composer who had undergone lithotomy (bladder stone) surgery and published a musical piece as a descriptive response to his experience. I started to imagine Marais listening to his surgeon mindlessly whistling a tune that would later become his composition. This of course inspired a mini comic about Marais, which in turn inspired research into: the history of surgery and lithotomy specifically; the type of equipment that was used; the position and table used: the French nursery song "Frère Jacques"; the traveling lithotomist, Frère Jacques (NOT the nursery song character as some articles assert); and the life and work of Marin Marais. I even found recordings of the music. I had a great time researching this (in a squeamish, thankful-for-Tylenol-and-Clorox-bleach kind of way.

This page introduces my history of Marais surgery.

Other inspiration has been rabies (the disease), the wandering uterus theorem, and many gag cartoons. The things we do for fun!