The Illustrious Dead

By Stephan Talty
Crown Publishers, $27.00, 317 pages

“I have never suffered so much…” An excerpt from a letter written by Napoleon’s surgeon-in-chief, Dr. Dominique-Jean Larrey, says much of the final state of things in the later days of the French campaign in Russia, November, 1812. “…We are by no means at the end of our troubles.”

The “end” apparently baffled medical science for some time. The pages of this tome are packed with carefully gathered historical data, not only on the events of 1812 but also regarding history’s prior blind dates with the dreaded “Typhus Fever.” One is compelled to read along with the speed usually reserved for thriller novels, hoping fervently that doctors link the symptoms with the carrier, somehow saving the campaign and the reputation of its dauntless leader, Napoleon Bonaparte.

Along with typhus’s past dabbles in humanity, Talty brilliantly mixes in tales of the advances in medicine, quack theories, bogus remedies and intrepid scientists who often fell victim to the very malady they sought to eradicate. The excellent storytelling wavers not throughout the entire piece; swiftly abandoning the feel of a textbook, the prose urges the reader ever onward to discover what really tipped the balance of power in so many pivotal instances.

Reviewed by Meredith Greene