William Harvey A Life in Circulation

In 1628, William Harvey published his revolutionary discovery that the blood circulated through the body. This one theory demolished 1,500 years of medical thinking, dating back to Galen and Roman times, and introduced a radical vision of the working of the human body that had profoundcultural consequences. Indeed, Harvey's theory influenced not only anatomists, but also economists, poets and political thinkers. Its impact on what we now call the "history of science," and on culture generally, was arguably as great as Darwin's theory of evolution or Newton's theory of gravity. Thomas Wright's biography of Harvey celebrates the meteoric rise of a yeoman's son to the elevated position of King's physician, and paints an admiring portrait of an extraordinary mind amid a fertile time in England's intellectual history. Set in late Renaissance London, Wright's vivid portraitfeatures an illustrious cast of historical characters, from Francis Bacon and John Donne to Robert Fludd, whose corroboration of Harvey's ideas helped launch his circulation theory. Wright traces Harvey's progress from the farmlands of Kent to England's royal palace, and offers a brilliantreconstruction of Harvey's epoch-making research, which involved countless dissections of human corpses and live animals. After he published his discoveries, Harvey became famous throughout Europe, where he toured the major universities, demonstrating his theory by vivisection. But when the CharlesI was toppled during the English Civil War in 1649, his court physician fell too, and Harvey found himself banished from London. He would ultimately die in relative obscurity, suffering from gout and melancholy. A victim of the political turmoil of the times, William Harvey nevertheless was the mainspring of vast historical changes in medicine and anatomy, launching a revolution that would continue to run its course long after his death.

Thomas Wright is the author of Built of Books: How Reading Defined the Life of Oscar Wilde, and of numerous articles for publications such as the Times Literary Supplement and the Independent. He is based in Italy and Oxford, where he teaches.

Part I: Raising Himself from the Ground
1. A Kentish upbringing (1578-1593): 'Half Farmer and half Gentleman'
2. Cambridge studies I (1593): 'Making low legs to a nobleman'
3. Cambridge studies II (c.1593-1599): 'Devoting himself assiduously to his studies'

Essay 1. Galen, Mondino and Vesalius: A brief history of anatomy
4. Paduan studies I (1599-c.1600): 'Fair Padua, nursery of the arts'
Essay 2. A dissection of sacred hearts, feeling hearts and thinking hearts
5. Paduan studies II (c.1600-1602): 'The exposition of anatomy'
6. Early years in London (c.1602-c.1610): 'Begin the world'
7. Advances (c.1610-c.1625): 'Good endeavours bring forth much good frute'

Part II: Placing his Head among the Stars
8. A public lecture (late 1610s): 'Nasty (yet recompensed by admirable variety)'
9. Private research (late 1610s-1620s): 'A dog, crow, kite, raven . . . anything to anatomize'
Essay 3. A short history of vivisection
10. Birth of the theory (late 1610s-1620s): 'I began to bethink my self'
Essay 4. Francis Bacon, experiment and empiricism
11. Demonstration (late 1610s-1620s): 'Whereby I offer you to perceive and judge'
Essay 5. The landscape of Harvey's imagination (I): Microcosm and macrocosm
Essay 6. The landscape of Harvey's imagination (II): Perfect circles
Essay 7. Everyday influences on Harvey's theory
12. Publication and reception (1628-1650s): '?'Twas beleeved . . . he was crack-brained'
13. Dissemination and defence (1628-1636): 'He is a circulator!'
Essay 8. Descartes' clockwork universe
14. Civil War years (the 1640s): 'Anabaptists, fanatics, robbers, and murderers'
15. Last years (the 1650s): 'Shitt-breeches'