Science of Sympathy

Rob Boddice works at the Department of History and Cultural Studies, Freie UniversitÄt Berlin. His books include Edward Jenner and Pain: A Very Short Introduction.

"Exemplary. Boddice demonstrates that the culture of Victorian science changed irreversibly what sympathy could mean, and how it could be felt. The book will be at the top of my list when people ask, 'What does it look like when you do the history of emotions?' This is what it looks like."--Daniel M. Gross, author of The Secret History of Emotion: From Aristotle's Rhetoric to Modern Brain Science"Stimulating and interesting. Boddice has taken some of the most important topics in nineteenth-century history and made them his own."--Joanna Bourke, author of The Story of Pain: From Prayer to Painkillers"A landmark work in the history of science and the emotions."--Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences  "Rob Boddice has provided an engaging exploration of three issues that were the source of much debate in the later Victorian period: vivisection, vaccination, and eugenics. . . . The Science of Sympathy is a welcome contribution to this still-emerging body of scholarship that has brought real illumination to the scientific cultures of the nineteenth century in particular."--Annals of Science "Boddice offer[s] challenging departures from Victorian evolutionary thought that reflect in rich and complex ways on the intellectual crosscurrents of Victorian culture and society, as well as the emerging contingencies of modernism." --Isis "The Science of Sympathy is an impressive achievement, stimulating, interesting, and well-written."--British Journal for the History of Science "A well-written and accessible book that clearly explains complex ideas while introducing the reader to the novel insights yielded by the study of the history of emotions . . . challenging and stimulating." --Victorian Studies