The dome of thought is the first study of phrenology based primarily on the popular - rather than medical - appreciation of this important and controversial pseudoscience. With detailed reference to the reports printed in popular newspapers from the early years of the nineteenth century to the fin de siecle, the book provides an unequalled insight into the Victorian public's understanding of the techniques, assumptions and implications of defining a person's character by way of the bumps on their skull. Highly relevant to the study of the many authors - Wilkie Collins, Charles Dickens, and George Eliot, among them - whose fiction was informed by the imagery of phrenology, The dome of thought will prove an essential resource for anybody with an interest in the popular and literary culture of the nineteenth century, including literary scholars, medical historians and the general reader.
- ISBN10 1526143720
- ISBN13 9781526143723
- Publish Date 30 March 2022 (first published 29 March 2022)
- Publish Status Active
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Manchester University Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 336
- Language English