MANHANDLING THE BRAIN: How did damaging the brains of the mentally ill ever seem a good idea?

In this festive episode Ken reads 'Manhandling the Brain', his essay on the origins of mid-20th century psychosurgery, an attempt to understand how, for over 20 years, so many people thought it such a good idea to damage the brains of the severely mentally ill and the lessons that can be learned.

Participants:

Ken Barrett, visual artist, writer and retired neuropsychiatrist: http://www.kenbarrettstudio.co.uk

Full text of the essay with bibliography and references are here, preceded by an essay on the early days of the EEG and more: http://www.kenbarrettstudio.co.uk/writing/

Bibliography top picks in bold)

Moniz E (1935), Tentatives operatoires dans le traitement de certaines psychoses, Masson, Paris.

Freeman W, Watts JW & Hunt T (1942) Psychosurgery: Intelligence, emotion and social behavior following prefrontal lobotomy for mental disorders. Springfield, Thomas.

Board of Control (1947), Pre-frontal Leucotomy in 1000 Cases, HMSO.

Shutts D (1982), Lobotomy: Resort to the Knife, Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York.

Rylander G ( 1948), Personality Analysis Before and After Frontal Lobotomy, in The Frontal Lobes , John F Fulton et al Eds., pp691-705. Williams and Wilkins, Baltimore.

Vallenstein ES (1986), Great and Desperate Cures: The Rise and Decline of Psychosurgery and Other Radical treatments for Mental Illness, Basic Books Inc..

Pressman JD, Last Resort: Psychosurgery and the Limits of Medicine, Cambridge University Press, 1998.

El-Hai J (2005), The Lobotomist: A Maverick Medical Genius and His Tragic Quest to Rid the World of Mental Illness, John Wiley & Sons.

Howard Dully and Charles Fleming, Messing with my Head: The shocking true story of my lobotomy, Vermilion, 2007.

Kotowicz Z (2012), Psychosurgery: the Birth of a New Scientific Paradigm, Centre for Philosophy of Science, University of Lisbon.

Raz M (2013), The Lobotomy Letters: The Making of American Psychosurgery , University of Rochester Press.

Ferone G & Vincent J-D (2011), Bienvenue en Transhumanie: sur l’homme de demain, Editions Grasset & Fasquelle, Paris.

Todes DP (2014), Ivan Pavlov: A Russian Life in Science, Oxford University Press.

Papers:

Hutton E L (1941), Early Results of Prefrontal Leucotomy, Lancet, July 5, 3-12.

Hutton E L (1942), The Investigation of Personality in Patients treated by Prefrontal Leucotomy, Journal of Mental Science, 371, 275-281.

Golla F L,(1943), The Range and Technique of Prefrontal Leucotomy, Journal of Mental Science, 89; 189-191.

Opening music: Prelude to the opera Brainland, composed by Stephen Brown.

For comment or to share your own essay Ken can be contacted at [e-mail]

Brainland the opera website: www.brainlandtheopera.co.uk

Festive wax model (of Walter Freeman) by KB

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