
Swallow
Foreign Bodies, Their Ingestion, Inspiration, and the Curious Doctor Who Extracted Them
Mary Cappello(Author)
The New Press
Will be published approx. on 14. June 2012
Book
Paperback/Softback
292 pages
978-1-59558-777-0 (ISBN)
Description
A beguiling and deeply rewarding exploration of Philadelphia's Mutter Museum Foreign Body Collection, drawers filled with items that have been swallowed. It is also a quirky portrait of Dr Chevalier Jackson, the pioneering laryngologist who extracted these items non-surgically. Animating the space between interest and terror, curiosity and dread, Capello explores the physiology of the human swallow, the poignant and psychology that compels people to ingest non-nutritive items. A history of racism, violence, class and poverty and forced ingestion.
Reviews / Votes
?A warm and thoroughly researched portrait."?The Washington Post
?Cappello ? brings a psychoanalytic richness to her understanding of ingestion and dentition."
?The Guardian
?[Cappello] packs her story with surprising imagery and extravagant lyricism, taking a highly literary approach on the subject."
?Salon
?One odd, and oddly haunting, book."
?Macleans
"Swallow is a surprising and original work. It is biography on the slant, a meditation that transcends boundaries and genres, written with scholarship, humor, and panache. I urge you to take this journey."
?Ricky Jay
"[Cappello's] writing style is wistful, wacky, and wise. . . . Swallow is a strange and alluring work of musings and medical history. . . . Occupying a curious position between Ripley's Believe It or Not and riveting biography, this book is something special."
?Tony Miksanek, MD, JAMA
"A wonderful and bizarre book: gorge yourself on it, and gulp."
?Simon Winchester, author of Atlantic
"Cappello's fine writing creates a book that goes down very easy."
?Paul Di Filippo, The Barnes & Noble Review
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
United Kingdom
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Unsewn / adhesive bound
Dimensions
Height: 208 mm
Width: 136 mm
Thickness: 20 mm
Weight
338 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-59558-777-0 (9781595587770)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Mary Cappello
Swallow
Foreign Bodies, Their Ingestion, Inspiration, and the Curious Doctor Who Extracted Them
E-Book
12/2010
1st Edition
New Press, The
€28.89
Available for download
Person
Mary Cappello is the author of Awkward (a Los Angeles Times bestseller), Called Back, and Night Bloom. A recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship, the Bechtel Prize for Educating the Imagination, and the Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize, she teaches at the University of Rhode Island and lives in Providence.
Content
Author's Note
I. Who Was That Man?
?Alone on Floor with Pile of Buttons"
Remembering Forward: The Idea of a Legacy
Fbdy #C804, Case #3268, X-rays #48451C and 48460C: The Case of Andrew C.
A Peculiar Chap
?The Life of Chevalier Jackson": Early Prototypes of Rescue
II. How Does Someone Swallow That?
Between Carelessness and Desire: Getting Objects Down
Chevalier Jackson's Traumatic ?Phases"
A Catastrophe of Childhood: Gastric Lavage
Chevalier Jackson's Tears: The Case of the Boy Who Cried
Fbdy (Multiple) #1173: Gavage: The Case of Joseph B.
Fbdy #2440: A Perfect Attendance Pin
?Strange Things Were on the Run from Mary's Deepest Depths": Hardware, Swords, Scopes
III. What Are These Things?
Fbdy #565: The Case of Margaret Derryberry: Objects Lost and Found and Lost Again
Instrumentality and Instruments as Things
Modernist Portals and Secular Tabernacles: Chevalier Jackson Meets Joseph Cornell
IV. Mystery Bones and the Unrecovered Boy
Select Bibliography
Acknowledgments
Index
I. Who Was That Man?
?Alone on Floor with Pile of Buttons"
Remembering Forward: The Idea of a Legacy
Fbdy #C804, Case #3268, X-rays #48451C and 48460C: The Case of Andrew C.
A Peculiar Chap
?The Life of Chevalier Jackson": Early Prototypes of Rescue
II. How Does Someone Swallow That?
Between Carelessness and Desire: Getting Objects Down
Chevalier Jackson's Traumatic ?Phases"
A Catastrophe of Childhood: Gastric Lavage
Chevalier Jackson's Tears: The Case of the Boy Who Cried
Fbdy (Multiple) #1173: Gavage: The Case of Joseph B.
Fbdy #2440: A Perfect Attendance Pin
?Strange Things Were on the Run from Mary's Deepest Depths": Hardware, Swords, Scopes
III. What Are These Things?
Fbdy #565: The Case of Margaret Derryberry: Objects Lost and Found and Lost Again
Instrumentality and Instruments as Things
Modernist Portals and Secular Tabernacles: Chevalier Jackson Meets Joseph Cornell
IV. Mystery Bones and the Unrecovered Boy
Select Bibliography
Acknowledgments
Index