John Hughlings Jackson (PDF)

John Hughlings Jackson (1835-1911) was a preeminent British neurologist who is widely recognized today as one of the leading founders of modern clinical neurology and neuroscience. He had a unique ability to translate messy clinical data into viable neuroscientific conceptions. This ability served him well, because in his early years knowledge of cerebral organization was quite rudimentary. Jean-Martin Charcot (1825-1893) faced the same problem at the same time in the 1860s, and each man recognized the other's work at a fundamental level. Although Jackson's historical standing has increased over the century since his death, there is only one full-length biography, the Critchleys' John Hughlings Jackson: Father of English Neurology (OUP 1998). Like the numerous articles and chapters that have been written about Jackson, that book is sometimes inaccurate and often hagiographic.

In this new biography, John Hughlings Jackson: Clinical Neurology, Evolution and Victorian Brain Science, Samuel H. Greenblatt provides a critical analysis of Jackson's work within the professional, social, and intellectual contexts of his Victorian milieu. The book follows Jackson's intellectual development through a close examination of his published writings, in chronological order, from the case reports and Suggestions of his early medical career to the major lectures he delivered in his later years. The text is supplemented with a comprehensive bibliography of Jackson's writings that will be of practical use to scholars of his work.