Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers

Prior to reading Mary Roach’s engaging nonfiction book Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers I, like many people, was woefully uninformed regarding the exciting after-life of many deceased bodies.  This well-researched and wryly written novel explores, in detail, the ways in which cadavers have influenced and continue to shape many aspects of our lives.  Consider, for example, your safety belt.  According to Roach “For every cadaver that rode the crash sleds to test three-point seat belts, 61 lives per year have been saved.” Even more interesting is the author’s discussion of the illicit act of body snatching.  When medical science was still fresh and new (as well as frighteningly barbaric) in the eighteenth and nineteenth century, cadavers for medical studies were hard to come by.  Many anatomist resorted to purchasing their stock from sometimes less-than-reputable dealers who would deliver their parcels via the back door.  Roach tells of “flummoxed anatomist who opened a crate delivered to his lab expecting a cadaver but found instead a ‘very fine ham, a large cheese, a basket of eggs, and a huge ball of yarn.’ One can only imagine the surprise and very special disappointment of the party expecting very fine ham, cheese, eggs, or a huge ball of yarn, who found instead a well-packed but quite dead Englishman.”  The book touches on every imaginable (and some unimaginable) aspect of a cadaver’s journey, delivering laughs, gasps, information along the way.  A fine book for those who like a little humor with their science.