Orwell’s Cough: Diagnosing the Medical Maladies & Last Gasps of the Great Writers
by John Ross (Oneworld, 2013)
Whereas the medical diagnoses alone would have made for a much shorter book, (Dr) Ross has used the subject of medicine as a unifying theme by which to biograph and contextualise a dozen famous writers, astutely dissecting their lives and (squalid) times.