Butcher: A novel

At times gruesome and disturbing, but a great book. Could not put it down even though I was horrified most of the time by what I was reading.

Today, we take ethics in medical research for granted, or at least most of us do. But in the early 19th century, when medicine began developing effective procedures for treating conditions and anesthetics for helping make the procedures tolerable, ethics of patient treatment wasn’t always top of mind. This was especially true when people, such as Southern chattel slaves, prisoners, and indentured servants, found themselves offered up for what passed for care, and for women who for various reasons, not the least of which was being judged difficult, where shipped off to mental institutions. None, of course, had agency over their lives, and so could not effectively object.Pretty much all of this characterized the career of the pioneering physician and medical researcher James Marion Sims, the father of gynecology, controversial in his day and to this day, just as it does the central character in JCO’s Butcher. Here, though, based on real medical history, Oates’ Dr. Silas Aloysius Weir practices on women confined to a fictional mental institution in New Jersey, and not Black slave women, as did Sims.Butcher is a horror tale told in the most graphic detail, a tale that illustrates the lack of personal agency all women of the time, the mid 19th century, whatever their social class and whatever their ages. There’s enough here to outrage every reader, to make every reader glad we live in the 21st century, and to raise concern that some would like to revert to what they imagine to have been the good old days, those being when successful white Christian men controlled everything.For example, as if the bloody graphic horror isn’t enough, throughout the novel, Oates shows just how little agency women had when she writes how they were shamed about how their bodies functioned, how they could not relate what ailed them themselves, how they had to communicate through intermediaries to their doctors, and how the men in their lives could have surgeries performed on them to control their supposed unruliness, their morals, or their hysteria, generally by the removal of reproductive organs.If anything above sets you off, well, just wait until you read this novel. And if you have the energy for it, look up and read about James Marion Sims.

Many of Ms. Oate's books are riveting and disturbing, and 'The Butcher' is no exception. While based on facts and history, it is a novel.'The Butcher' details the life of Dr. Silas Aloysius Weir, the so-called father of gyno-psychiatry, as well as several women who resided in the New Jersey Asylum for Female Lunatics in New Jersey during the nineteenth century.Dr. Weir was an unconscionable misogynist who experimented relentlessly and without compassion on his female patients. His primary goal was to be admired and respected by others of his ilk. His regard for his patients' suffering and pain was nil, and his experimentation went on for decades.The lives of the female patients, some of whom he promoted to be his assistants, are fascinating. It feels almost unendurable to try and describe what they put up with in the hands of Dr. Weir.The Butcher had me in its grips from the beginning and I was unable to put it down until I finished the last page. Yes, it is traumatic and painful, but it is beautifully written and the characters are fully fleshed out. I highly recommend this novel to anyone who loves literary and historical fiction.

3.5 starsThe title is definitely apt. The doctor in this novel, who runs a female asylum, is a butcher of women and girls. This book seems to be loosely based on the real-life figure, James Marion Sims. Known as the “father of modern gynecology,” he performed cruel and heinous experiments on enslaved Black women. In this book, our main character is known as the “father of gyno-psychiatry” and has no issue butchering people of a lower station than him, particularly women who are indentured servants or deemed “lunatics.” His experimental and inhumane surgeries often led to death, which is no surprise. Like Sims, Dr. Weir also favored performing surgeries without anesthesia, which is absolutely barbaric.Dr. Weir is also quite delusional. He thinks of himself as a genius guided by God, but he’s just a foolish man looking to make a name for himself. He’s a monster and I felt bad for the patients who were abused and taken advantage by him. There are some particularly graphic and brutal surgeries, especially in the second half of the novel. I was wincing at some of the rationale Dr. Weir had for his experiments and surgeries. I do think this novel was a tad long, but overall it was a powerful read highlighting how awful some doctors were back in the day.

Classic JCO. I could not put it down. Macabre is an understatement

Really gruesome account of an abusive doctor at a women’s asylum. Very interesting and well done yet hard to get through.

This is my second JCO book (first one is Zombie), and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Based on real events, it makes me wonder how psychiatry 150 years from now will look back on how we treat people today.This book is full of graphic depictions of abuse towards mentally ill women and the mistreatment they suffered all in the name of science.

Oates takes the reader into a world of the verboten and still we hear thoughts and yearnings and memories . The journals describing the horrific medical crimes are devastating. The unspoken is poetry in her hands..

Frightening story.