True History of the Elephant Man

by Howell, Michael; Ford, Peter

• ISBN13: 9780749005160
• ISBN10: 0749005165
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-09-01
• Publisher: Allison & Busby

Summary

Joseph Carey Merrick, born in England on August 5, 1952, is better known as The Elephant Man. Through horrible physical deformities which were almost impossible to describe, he spent much of his life exhibited as a fairground freak until even nineteenth-century sensibilities could take no more. Hounded, persecuted and starving, he ended up at London's Liverpool Street Station where he was rescued, housed and fed by the distinguished surgeon Frederick Treves. To Treves' surprise, he discovered during the course of their friendship that lurking beneath the mass of Merrick's corrupting flesh lived a spirit that was as courageous as it had been tortured, and a nature as gentle and dignified as it had been deprived and tormented. The subject of several books, a Broadway hit, and a film, Joseph Merrick has become part of popular mythology. Here, in this fully revised edition containing new details, are the true and unromantic facts of his life. This is an extraordinary and moving story, set among the brutal realities of the Victorian world, telling of a tragic individual and his survival against overwhelming odds.

Table of Contents

List of Plates	ix
Preface and Acknowledgements	xi
`The great Freak of nature - Half-a-Man and Half-an-Elephant'	1	(13)
On the Threshould of Eminence	14	(8)
A Living Specimen	22	(10)
A Parade of Elephants and Early Griefs	32	(15)
The Mercy of the Parish	47	(18)
The Silver King	65	(14)
A Travelling Life	79	(12)
Come Safely into Harbour	91	(18)
'Such a Gentle, Kindly Man, Poor Thing!'	109	(18)
What Was the Matter With Joseph Merrick?	127	(13)
The Burden Falls Away	140	(13)
The Figure in Time's Fabric	153	(20)
Appendix One: The Autobiography of Joseph Carey Merrick	173	(3)
Appendix Two: The Elephant Man, amplified from an account In the British Medical Journal	176	(5)
Appendix Three: 'The Elephant Man' by Sir Frederick Treves	181	(20)
Bibliography	201	(6)
Index	207