The Emperor of All Maladies: Difference between revisions

{{short description|Book by Siddhartha Mukherjee on the history of cancer and oncology}}

'''''The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer''''' is a book written by [[Siddhartha Mukherjee]], an Indian-born American physician and [[oncology|oncologist]]. It was published on 16 November 2010 by [[Charles Scribner's Sons|Scribner]].

== Title ==

The book explains its title in its [[front matter|author's note]]:<ref>Page xvii</ref>

{{Blockquote|In a sense, this is a military history—one in which the adversary is formless, timeless, and pervasive. Here, too, there are victories and losses, campaigns upon campaigns, heroes and hubris, survival and resilience—and inevitably, the wounded, the condemned, the forgotten, the dead. In the end, cancer truly emerges, as a nineteenth-century surgeon once wrote in a book's frontispiece, as "the emperor of all maladies, the [[wiktionary:King of Terrors|king of terrors]]."}}

== Content ==

The book weaves together Mukherjee's experiences as a [[hematology]]/[[oncology]] [[Fellowship (medicine)|fellow]] at [[Massachusetts General Hospital]] as well as the history of cancer treatment and research.<ref name="NPR">{{cite news|url= https://www.npr.org/2010/11/17/131382460/an-oncologist-writes-a-biography-of-cancer |title=An Oncologist Writes 'A Biography Of Cancer'|work=Fresh Air from WHYY|publisher=NPR|accessdate=1 August 2011|date=17 November 2010}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.denverpost.com/books/ci_16711249|title=Review: "The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer," by Siddhartha Mukherjee|newspaper=[[Denver Post]]|first=Susan|last=Okie|date=28 November 2010|accessdate=29 September 2011}}</ref> Mukherjee gives the history of cancer from its first identification 4,600 years ago by the Egyptian physician [[Imhotep]]. The Greeks had no understanding of cells, but they were familiar with hydraulics. [[Hippocrates]] thus considered illness to be an imbalance of four cardinal fluids: blood, black bile, yellow bile, phlegm. [[Galen]] applied this idea to [[cancer]], believing it to be an imbalance of black bile. In 440 BC, the Greek historian [[Herodotus]] recorded the first breast tumor excision of [[Atossa]], the queen of [[Persia]] and the daughter of [[Cyrus the Great|Cyrus]], by a Greek slave named [[Democedes]]. The procedure was believed to have been successful temporarily. Galen's theory was later challenged by the work of [[Andreas Vesalius|Andreas Vaselius]] and [[Matthew Baillie|Matthew Baille]], whose dissections of human bodies failed to reveal black bile.

In the 19th century, [[surgeon]]s devised various approaches to remove tumors, like [[William Halsted]] and the [[radical mastectomy]]. Additionally, [[Emil Grubbe]] used [[X-ray]]s to treat cancer, thus identifying another treatment modality. [[Rudolph Virchow]] first observed [[leukemia]], and [[Franz Ernst Christian Neumann]] localized the pathology to the bone marrow.

In the 20th century, cancer became the second most common cause of death after heart disease in the [[United States]]. [[Sidney Farber]] induced temporary remission in pediatric leukemia using [[antifolate]]s developed by [[Yellapragada Subbarow]]. [[Louis S. Goodman|Louis Goodman]] and [[Alfred Gilman Sr.|Alfred Gilman]] also used [[nitrogen mustard]] to treat [[lymphoma]]. The [[National Cancer Institute]] (NCI) introduced [[clinical trial]]s to test the efficacy of [[chemotherapy]]. Recognizing the possibility for a cure, Farber sought funding for his efforts through [[The Jimmy Fund]] and [[Mary Lasker]]. Inspired by the [[Space Race]], Farber and Lasker appealed to the nation and [[President Nixon]] to enact legislation for the [[War on Cancer]], resulting in the passage of the National Cancer Act of 1971 and increased funding for the NCI.

The book also reviews the origins of [[hospice]] and [[palliative medicine]] and [[cancer screening]].

According to Mukherjee, the book was a response to the demand of a patient: "I'm willing to go on fighting, but I need to know what it is that I'm battling."<ref name=McGrath>{{cite news|last=McGrath|first=Charles|title=How Cancer Acquired Its Own Biographer|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/09/books/09mukherjee.html |accessdate=22 December 2012|newspaper=The New York Times|date=8 November 2010}}</ref> Mukherjee states that two of his influences for the book were [[Randy Shilts]]' ''[[And the Band Played On]]'' and [[Richard Rhodes]]' ''[[The Making of the Atomic Bomb]]'', but the defining moment for him was "when he conceived of his book as a biography".<ref name=McGrath />

== Reception ==

''The Emperor of All Maladies'' won the 2011 [[Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction]]: the jury called it "an elegant inquiry, at once clinical and personal".<ref name=Pulitzer>{{cite web|last=The Pulitzer Prizes|title=The 2011 Pulitzer Prize Winners General Nonfiction|url=http://www.pulitzer.org/citation/2011-General-Nonfiction|accessdate=22 December 2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-04-19/nri-achievers/29446649_1_cancer-indian-american-physician-award-winning-science-writer|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121105055532/http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-04-19/nri-achievers/29446649_1_cancer-indian-american-physician-award-winning-science-writer|url-status=dead|archive-date=5 November 2012|title=Indian doc's book on cancer wins Pulitzer Prize|date=19 April 2011|accessdate=29 September 2011|newspaper=[[The Times of India]]|location=Boston}}</ref><ref name="NPR" /> ''[[The Guardian]]'' wrote that "Mukherjee manages to convey not only a forensically precise picture of what he sees, but a shiver too, of what he feels."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/jan/23/emperor-maladies-biography-cancer-siddhartha-mukherjee-review|title = The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee—review| website=[[TheGuardian.com]] |date = 23 January 2011}}</ref> ''[[Literary Review]]'' commended Mukherjee's narrative: "It is so well written, and the science is so clearly explained, that it reads almost like a detective story—which, of course, it is."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://literaryreview.co.uk/the-unnameable|title=The Unnameable|first=Anthony|last=Daniels|website=[[Literary Review]]|date=March 2011}}</ref>

It was described, by the magazine [[Time (magazine)|''TIME'']], as one of the 100 most influential books of the last 100 years,<ref>{{cite magazine|url=http://entertainment.time.com/2011/08/30/all-time-100-best-nonfiction-books/slide/the-emperor-of-all-maladies-by-siddhartha-mukherjee/|title=All-TIME 100 Nonfiction Books|first=Gilbert|last=Cruz|magazine=Time|date=17 August 2011|accessdate=16 December 2017}}</ref> and by ''[[The New York Times Magazine]]'' as among the 100 best works of non-fiction.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://6thfloor.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/17/as-if-you-dont-have-enough-to-read/|title=As if You Don't Have Enough to Read|first=Hugo|last=Lindgren |department=''The 6th Floor'' |website=[[The New York Times Magazine]] |access-date=16 December 2017}}</ref>

* 2012: German: ''Der König aller Krankheiten'', Barbara Schaden ({{ISBN|978-3832196448}}).

* 2012: Spanish: ''El emperador de todos los males: Una biografía del cáncer'', Editorial Taurus ({{ISBN|6071112362}})

* 2013: Arabic: ''إمبراطور الأمراض: سيرة ذاتية للسرطان'', Tariq Olayan ({{ISBN|978-603-8086-27-8}})

* 2013: Norwegian: ''Keiseren over alle sykdommer- kreftens biografi'', Press ({{ISBN|9788275475105}}).

* 2013: Japanese: ''病の皇帝「がん」に挑む ― 人類4000年の苦闘'', [[Hayakawa Publishing]] ({{ISBN|4152093951}})

* 2015: Icelandic: ''Meistari allra meina: Ævisaga krabbameins'', Forlagið ({{ISBN|978-9979-53-617-8}}).

* 2015: Czech: ''Vládkyně všech nemocí'', Masarykova univerzita ({{ISBN|978-80-210-7761-4}}).

== Further reading ==

*{{cite news|url= https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/31/magazine/31Cancer-t.html |title= The Riddle of Cancer Relapse: The Cancer Sleeper Cell|author=Mukherjee, Siddhartha |work=The New York Times Magazine |date=29 October 2010}} Mukherjee's ''New York Times Magazine'' article based on his book.

== External links ==

* {{OL work}}

* [http://www.c-span.org/video/?298385-1/book-discussion-emperor-maladies-biography-cancer Discussion of ''The Emperor of All Maladies'' with Mukherjee, February 18, 2011] at [[C-SPAN]]

* [http://www.c-span.org/video/?301663-4/book-discussion-emperor-maladies Discussion of ''The Emperor of All Maladies'' with Mukherjee, September 25, 2011] at [[C-SPAN]]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Emperor of All Maladies}}

[[Category:Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction-winning works]]