Charles Richet and the social role of medical men

Journal of Medical Biography

Volumn 9, Issue 4, 2001, Pages 213-219

  Schneider, William H ^a  

^a INDIANA UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

anaphylaxis; C Richet; pacifism; psychic phenomena; two cultures

Indexed keywords

ANAPHYLAXIS; ART; ARTICLE; FRANCE; HISTORY; HUMAN; PARAPSYCHOLOGY; PHYSICIAN ATTITUDE; PHYSIOLOGY; RESEARCH; SCIENCE; SOCIOLOGY;

ANAPHYLAXIS; FRANCE; HISTORY, 19TH CENTURY; HISTORY, 20TH CENTURY; HUMANS; PARAPSYCHOLOGY; PHYSICIAN'S ROLE; PHYSIOLOGY; PORTRAITS; RESEARCH; SCIENCE; SOCIOLOGY;

EID: 0035511610     PISSN: 09677720     EISSN: 17581087     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/096777200100900404     Document Type: Article

References (28)

1. For studies of Carrel and Rostand, see Juste A. La vie et l'oeuvre de Jean Rostand. Paris: Stock, 1971; and Drouard A. Alexis Carrel (1873–1944): de la mémoire à l'histoire. Paris: L'Harmattan, 1995. On Einstein's early popularity in America, see Why Missner M. Einstein became famous in America. Social Studies of Science 1985; 15: 267–91. On Thomas, there is one biography, Angyal AJ. Lewis Thomas. Boston: Twayne, 1989; but for a braoder view of Medawar, see a videotape production for the Discovery series, The Hope of Progress (1989). Both also have left autobiographical accounts. There is a larger number of medical men by training who have achieved notoriety in other fields. Perhaps the most obvious examples have been the medical men of letters. The success of Michael Crichton notwithstanding, a more classic case can be found in Elliott C Lantos J, Eds. The Last Physician: Walker Percy and the Moral Life of Medicine. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999. For English examples, see Smithers DW. This Idle Trade: On Doctors Who Were Writers. Tunbridge Wells: Dragonfly Press, 1989. In France, the best-documented studies have been on doctors in politics. Here, for example, a man like Clemenceau, who was trained in medicine, represents only the tip of the iceberg, since of all deputies in the French Chamber from 1898 to 1940 11% had medical training. See Dogan M. Les filières de la carrière politique en France. Revue française de sociologie 1967; 8: 478; and Ellis JD. The Physician Legislators of France: Medicine and Politics in the Early Third Republic, 1870–1914. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990. On the French tradition of intellectuals involved in politics, see Winock M. Le siècle des intellectuals. Paris: Editions Seuil, 1997. With the exception of individuals such as Jean Perrin and Paul Langevin, these were rarely scientists of great reputation. See Charle C. Naissance des “intellectuals.” Paris: Editions de Minuit, 1990
2. For a recent biography that reflects the complexity of Richet, see Wolf S. Brain, Mind and Medicine: Charles Richet and the Origins of Physiological Psychology. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 1993. In addition, see the entry for Richet in Dictionary of Scientific Biography (henceforth DSB), the obituaries mentioned below, and the medical thesis by Juri M. Charles Richet Physiologiste, 1850–1935. Zurich: Juris Druck, 1965. Kroker K. Immunity and its other: the anaphylactic selves of Charles Richet. Studies in the Philosophy of Biology and the Biomedical Sciences 1999;30:273–96, has proposed an explanation of Richet's discovery of anaphylaxis based on his broader social and political views
3. The obituaries of Richet invariably referred to his breadth of interests as being “encyclopaedic”, the product of a “universal curiosity”. Achard M. Décès de Charles M. Richet. Comptes rendus de la Société de biologie 1935; 120: 927; Mayer A. Notice nécrologique sur M. Charles Richet (1850–1935). Bulletin de l'Académie de médicine 1936; 115: 53. Gustave Roussy, Secretary-General of the Academy of Medicine, chose Richet as the subject of his annual elegy in 1945, and compared him to such Renaissance men as Leonardo da Vinci, Erasmus and Vesalius, because of “the diversity of the fields where his intelligence satisfied itself”. Roussy G. Charles Richet (1850–1935). Bulletin de l'Académie de médicine 1945; 129: 720. Roussy was not just referring to Richet's scientific work, since half of the elegy was devoted to the physiologist's literary and philosophical writings. André Meyer's 1935 obituary concluded with a long quote from Diderot's Encyclopédie entry for “Genius”, a term he thought particularly appropriate for Richet. Mayer A (Brain, Mind and Medicine: Charles Richet and the Origins of Physiological Psychology.): 64
4. Le Peuple, 5 December 1935
5. Richet C. DSB: 428
6. Richet was very defensive about the failure, alleging it to be like having malaria sufferers take only a tenth the dose of quinine and concluding it was not the cure. Richet C. Autobiographie. In: Busquet P Genty M, Eds. Biographies médicales. Paris: Baillière, 1939: vol. 5, p. 178; and Richet C. Memoires sur moi et les autres (unpublished manuscript kindly furnished by his grandsons, Gabriel and Denis), Ch. 6, pp. 8–16
7. Richet C. Souvenirs d'une physiologiste. Paris: J Peyronnet, 1933: 147–50; Richet C. Du somnabulisme provoqué. Journal de l'anatomie et de la physiologie normales et pathologiques de l'homme et des animaux 1875; 11: 348–78
8. Richet S. Souvenirs (Du somnabulisme provoqué ref. 7): 152–3
9. Roussy G (Souvenirs ref. 3): 730; Roger H, Charles Richet. Presse médicale 1935; 43: 2044
10. Richet C. Souvenirs ((Souvenirs ref. 3) ref. 7): 139
11. See Schneider WH. Quality and Quantity: The Quest for Biological Regeneration in Twentieth-Century France. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990: 103–15
12. Comptes rendus des séances de l'Académie des Sciences 1886; 102: 1302 1415; 1887;104:1385, 1415; 1894; 118: 1127 1131 1137; 1901; 132: 1197 1212; 1912; 154: 325 627 680; 1914; 158: 150 166–7, 217
13. Richet C. Memoires, Ch.4, p. 88 (Comptes rendus des séances de l'Académie des Sciences ref. 6); also Souvenirs, pp. 42–5 (Comptes rendus des séances de l'Académie des Sciences ref. 7)
14. Richet C. Memoires, Ch. 4, pp. 93–4 (Memoires, Ch.4 ref. 6). Rogers FB. Index Medicus in the twentieth century. In: Blake JB, ed. Centenary of Index Medicus. Bethesda: US Department of Health and Human Services, 1980:53. The American Index Catalogue never had more than 500 subscribers, of which the army accounted for 20% of the copies. Richet had only 200 subscribers; Henri de Rothschild purchased one-third of the copies
15. Richet C. Memoires, Ch. 6, pp. 58–9 (Index Medicus in the twentieth century ref. 6)
16. Richet C. Souvenirs, pp. 68–9 (Memoires, Ch ref. 7). In the process, he discovered one unexpected advantage of the drug when his brother-in-law and dean of the medical faculty, Louis Landouzy, prescribed chloralose for a patient who was the wife of an important politician apparently suffering from insomnia. The woman proceeded to use it in a suicide attempt by taking an overdose of 20 times the normal prescribed amount. Rather than cause a scandal, the attempt failed, and after 48 hours of a deep sleep she awoke without any harmful after-effects
17. Richet C. DSB: 427
18. Richet C. Memoires, Ch. 4, pp. 16–18 (DSB ref. 6)
19. Richet C. Accroisement de la population française. Revue des deux mondes, ser. 3, 1882; 50: 900–32; 1882; 51: 587–616
20. Revue des deux mondes, ser. 3:610
21. Richet C. Sélection humaine. Paris: Félix Alcan, 1919: 15
22. Richet C. Le passé de la guerre et l'avenir de la Paix. Paris: Ollendorff, 1907; 6–7, as cited in Juri M (Sélection humaine ref. 2):33–4
23. For a good summary, see Juri M (Le passé de la guerre et l'avenir de la Paix ref. 2):33–6
24. Richet C. MemoiRes. (For a good summary, see ref. 6), Ch. 7, pp. 22 24
25. MemoiRes.: Ch.7, pp. 42–58; Richet C. Souvenirs (MemoiRes. ref. 7): 117–19
26. Richet C. Souvenirs (Souvenirs (MemoiRes. ref. 7): Ch.7 ref. 7):65–8
27. Richet C. Memoires (Souvenirs ref. 6): Ch. 2, pp. 86–87; Souvenirs (Souvenirs ref. 7):50–3
28. Richet C. MemoiRes. (Memoires ref. 6): Ch. 5, pp. 33–43