The Good Doctor Guillotin

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2009 Paperback Brand New Paperback, clean, tight, unmarked, no spine or cover creases. (Fine)() The Good Doctor Guillotin follows five characters to a common destination the ... scaffold at the first guillotining of the French Revolution: Dr. Guillotin, of course, a physician and member of the National Assembly, involved in many important events, including the Tennis Court Oath. Nicolas Pelletier, the first victim or patient as they were sometimes called, since the new beheading machine was seen as a humanitarian. Read more Show Less

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Overview

The extraordinary story of the Devil in the Device follows five characters to a common destination — the scaffold at the first mechanical beheading of the French Revolution:

  • Dr. Guillotin, a physician and member of the National Assembly, involved in many important events, including the Tennis Court Oath.
  • Nicolas Pelletier, the first "patient," as they were sometimes called, since the new machine was thought a humanitarian medical intervention in state-ordered death.
  • Father Pierre, a man torn between his religion and...
See more details below

More About This Book

Overview

The extraordinary story of the Devil in the Device follows five characters to a common destination — the scaffold at the first mechanical beheading of the French Revolution:

  • Dr. Guillotin, a physician and member of the National Assembly, involved in many important events, including the Tennis Court Oath.
  • Nicolas Pelletier, the first "patient," as they were sometimes called, since the new machine was thought a humanitarian medical intervention in state-ordered death.
  • Father Pierre, a man torn between his religion and an equally strong commitment to the poor and their revolution
  • Sanson, the famous green-clad executioner of Paris who, nine months later would execute the king and retire in remorse.
  • Tobias Schmidt, the free-thinking piano maker who built the new machine, predicting the coming Terror but offering his craft to it: The revolution, after all, had reduced the sale of pianos.

Louis XVI, Mozart, Mesmer, the Marquis de Sade, Marat, Robespierre, and other historical figures also make their appearance here. But — as with all of Estrin's work — The Good Doctor Guillotin is no simple historical novel. His imaginative 18th century story is intercut with passages in the author's distinctively modern voice, passages that move this bit of deep history into the context of our own contemporary machinations.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly
Using a hybrid of fiction and political commentary, Estrin recounts the events leading up to the construction of France's first guillotine in this heavy-handed and slow-moving book. The story centers on a doctor, Guillotin, a member of the 1780s National Assembly, who argues for a more humane method of execution. Other important players are Nicolas Jacques Pelletier, the first man to lose his head to the new device; Tobias Schmidt, the piano maker who built the new “painless device”; Charles-Henri Sanson, an executioner; and Pierre-René Grevier, Pelletier's spiritual adviser. Mozart, the Marquis de Sade and, of course, Louis XVI make appearances, with the latter suggesting a modification to the very blade that would end his life only a short time later. Though Estrin evokes revolutionary and pre-revolutionary France, and Dr. Guillotin becomes real through his political tirades, the other characters remain static. Most troublesome, though, is Estrin's intrusion into the narrative to deliver his case against the death penalty (it reads like something from a freshman civics class). The project, overall, has potential, but the execution is botched. (Sept.)
Library Journal
Delivering a polemic against capital punishment, Estrin (Insect Dreams) follows five characters, each of whom plays a major role in the first execution by guillotine in Paris in 1792. They include Pelletier, the victim; Sanson, the executioner; Schmidt, the machine's builder; and Father Grenier, Pelletier's spiritual counselor. But the principal protagonist is Doctor Guillotin, whose advocacy of a more merciful method of execution led to the guillotine's development. Though these characters are based on real people, Guillotin is the only genuinely compelling and three-dimensional one here—perhaps because he is one of the few about whom much is known, given his extensive writings. The use of an omniscient third-person narrator allows Estrin to include chapters reflecting on the execution's significance and the issue of capital punishment today. These sections are generally preachy and not particularly enlightening. VERDICT The portrayal of Guillotin is this novel's principal strength. Admirers of Estrin's novels and readers of literary fiction who aren't put off by the author's strident opposition to capital punishment may enjoy.—Douglas Southard, CRA International, Boston

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9781932961850
  • Publisher: Unbridled Books
  • Publication date: 9/29/2009
  • Pages: 336
  • Product dimensions: 5.00 (w) x 8.90 (h) x 0.90 (d)

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