Victor Horsley

Michael J. Aminoff, a neurologist and neurophysiologist, is Distinguished Professor in the Department of Neurology, School of Medicine, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA. Dr Aminoff has a special interest in medical history and has authored two previously published biographies of illustrious nineteenth-century clinician-scientists.

• Preface; 1. Early days; 2. The other side of Gower streets; 3. At the Brown; 4. Dividing the indivisible: The localization of cortical functions; 5. The making of a specialty; 6. The grammar of neurosurgery: technical underpinnings; 7. The neurosurgery of specific disorders; 8. Measures of the man; 9. The politics of protection; 10. Not so trivial pursuits: the slide into politics; 11. Antivivisectionist claims and clamor; 12. Bitter tears: Horsley and the suffragist movement; 13. Last orders: the temperance movement; 14. Syphilis and the public health; 15. A surgeon goes to war; 16. Aftermaths and appraisals; Appendix 1: Horsley's procedure for cranial surgery; Appendix 2: Appointments, honors, and awards; Appendix 3: Victor Horsley's professional publications; Appendix 4: Sir Victor Horsley's correspondence with the times of London.

'This book, which I could not put down and read in one sitting, brims with wonderful information and details that fully justify the subtitle - Sir Victor Horsley has a prodigious legacy. Aminoff's multilayered book condensing a lifetime of troubles and triumphs is not only for neurosurgeons, but also for anyone interested in the evolution of the neurosciences.' Eelco Wijdicks, The Lancet