Essays

Concerns about doctors and medical practice that so exercised George Bernard Shaw in 1906 when his play, The Doctor’s Dilemma, was first produced are still relevant today: rationing, moralising, ineffective …

Few poets have attracted as much interest and scholarship as John Keats, one of the most beloved of the romantic poets. Both his life, tragically curtailed in 1821 at the …

When, in 1840, Will Clapham named his first son, James Lambert Clapham, he expected him to become a doctor. So how did he end up a farmer in New Zealand?

How did James Lambert’s childhood in Essex shape the man who was to play a key role in triggering reform of the great London hospitals and the medical profession?

Understanding the past is essential for successfully changing the future. Yet policymakers pay little attention to history.

How, in the space of twenty-five years, did a small town in Kent of only 20 000 people, acquire eleven hospitals and 10 000 beds?