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ronanmcd's review
5.0
This is a really interesting idea for a book and just as strongly pulled off. Medieval ideas about bodies, or more particularly body parts, are surveyed through the arts. But scientific and medical theories and ideas from the time are also examined. In the absence of firm knowledge these turn out to be lyrical also.
The book's production is exemplary. Stunning.
The book's production is exemplary. Stunning.
likeyoustoleit's review against another edition
4.0
Written with great passion and care. I would absolutely recommend this to anyone curious about the subject. My only disappointment was that the description led me to believe that there would be more discussion of the Islamic & Jewish worlds of the same time period. They were certainly touched on, but Christian Medieval Europe is the real heart of this book. So just note that before you read!
cortomaltese's review against another edition
informative
medium-paced
5.0
An absolute delight! I had a lot of fun with this. A wonderful intersection of some of my dearest interests, told in a fantastic way. I've seen others I know mention the author's frequent digressions, but to be honest I never once found them an issue; I never complain about learning more, even if to me it may feel irrelevant, but I never thought the tangents in this book were irrelevant. It all felt, if nothing else, contextual and painting a broader picture of this very intersectional topic. Great if you want a start to learning about a nicher aspect of history. Bravo.
canada_matt's review against another edition
dark
funny
informative
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
Historian Jack Hartnell had me highly intrigued when I came upon this book. His exploration of the human body and the importance of its various parts during the Middle Ages proves to be educational to the attentive reader. Hartnell illustrates just how different body importance was in medieval times, as opposed to today, while offering detailed explanations of how the body was understood. Full of detail and covering parts from head to toe (literally), Hartnell dazzles in this unique piece of historical fiction. Just what I needed to raise an eyebrow, some of the only hair I have on my 21st century head!
Jack Hartnell pulls no punches when he open this tome, letting the reader know that the book seeks not only to explore the body, but offer a detailed contrast between modern times and the medieval era. He thoroughly goes through each part of the body and shares scientific understandings, artistic renderings, and eve religious importance from the medieval days. One such exploration would be the understanding of hair, thought to be a concentration of bodily fumes pushed out through the pores. Those with little hair would surely be lacking one of these medical humours, which explains why men had a denser concentration of hair and some of the weaknesses baldness might have had for both sexes at the time.
Hartness also offers some great explanations where some modern English idioms came into practice, including being broken hearted or losing one’s head. These provide the reader an “aha” moment and injects context few would likely have known before. The humour that emerges. throughout these analyses lightened the mood during some of the writing that could get quite dense or philosophical. The vignettes used to explain them help bring things full circle and entertain with easily understood explanations.
Balancing medicine, mysticism, artistic rendering, and even politics of the time, the medieval body was so important and taken seriously. Hartnell stresses this throughout the various chapters, each building on those that came before it. I found myself hooked and learning so much, getting lost in the stories as I tried to digest all that I was discovering.
While I have always enjoyed unique, history-based tomes, this one by Jack Hartness took things to a whole new level. The book had moments of dense analysis, light banter, and interesting tidbits that the reader likely had no idea could tie the two eras together. Hartnell provides vivid description of the body while contrasting how modern views differed greatly from the past. Chapters separate the differing parts of the body, yet link them all together, throughout the tome. I took so much away from this book and can only hope that I discover more of Jack Hartnell’s work in the future, as it was quite the experience.
Kudos, Mr. Hartnell, for such an ‘eye opening’ piece that shows you put your ‘heart’ into it.
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shrimpybear's review against another edition
4.0
I really loved this and i think i will buy my own copy because the pictures and sources were just so incredible!!! Only thing is that it sometimes gets like a high school essay of mine where it just extrapolates interpretation and symbolism REALLY fast and wantonly that I'm like okay that's really a bit much. And some of the subsections were super contrived in his trying to fit it into the narrative structure. But I really really like this!
siria's review against another edition
2.0
I was excited to read this, because it got rave reviews and the cover is so enticing—I thought perhaps it could become the core text for a course I'm thinking of teaching on the medieval body and medicine in the near future. Unfortunately, while lavishly illustrated and containing some interesting anecdotes, Medieval Bodies is a let down. It's an example of the pitfalls that can befall someone who's writing not only about a very broad topic, encompassing all of Europe and the Mediterranean region over the period of a thousand years, but also outside of their discipline.
Jack Hartnell is an art historian, and it shows. While his teasing apart of the objects and images he discusses is often very well done, his analysis of texts is often, um, less so, and his historiography is often dated and/or shallow. So for instance, you cannot talk about how Urban II's 1095 call to Crusade shows anything about his own racial thinking, because the text of his sermon doesn't survive. (We've got, I think, something like four medieval versions, written down from people's memories of the speech well after the fact—they all diverge substantially. Any undergrad could see the problems with using this as a source for Urban's thinking.) His account of medieval women and their access to power was positively Duby-esque (Duby's not mentioned in the bibliography, but given that Hartnell doesn't seem to have read deeper on the topic than Schaus's Encyclopedia, that's unsurprising). Those are big picture failings, but there are also lots of factual mistakes. For instance, the Catalan Atlas isn't oriented towards the north—it's a portolan chart, so "orientation" doesn't apply. I'm pretty sure Mansa Musa is depicted on it holding either a world orb or a lump of gold ore, not "an enormous gold coin."
These examples could all be multiplied, but I don't like reviews which descend into a litany of all the errors in a book—especially when there's the kernel of such a good idea and approach here. Suffice to say this is not the introductory survey I hoped it could be.
Jack Hartnell is an art historian, and it shows. While his teasing apart of the objects and images he discusses is often very well done, his analysis of texts is often, um, less so, and his historiography is often dated and/or shallow. So for instance, you cannot talk about how Urban II's 1095 call to Crusade shows anything about his own racial thinking, because the text of his sermon doesn't survive. (We've got, I think, something like four medieval versions, written down from people's memories of the speech well after the fact—they all diverge substantially. Any undergrad could see the problems with using this as a source for Urban's thinking.) His account of medieval women and their access to power was positively Duby-esque (Duby's not mentioned in the bibliography, but given that Hartnell doesn't seem to have read deeper on the topic than Schaus's Encyclopedia, that's unsurprising). Those are big picture failings, but there are also lots of factual mistakes. For instance, the Catalan Atlas isn't oriented towards the north—it's a portolan chart, so "orientation" doesn't apply. I'm pretty sure Mansa Musa is depicted on it holding either a world orb or a lump of gold ore, not "an enormous gold coin."
These examples could all be multiplied, but I don't like reviews which descend into a litany of all the errors in a book—especially when there's the kernel of such a good idea and approach here. Suffice to say this is not the introductory survey I hoped it could be.
tamargabrielle's review against another edition
5.0
Hartnell brings biology, history, art, and culture together wonderfully. He shows how the medieval ages aren't something to look down upon as we sometimes do. They are the foundation upon which the Renaissance and enlightenment are built, and it has plenty of beauty, strangeness, and creativity on its own. He makes it familiar, and yet still has an otherworldly feel to it as well.