Sir Richard Burton: Not the Actor, the Other One

Recently I had cause to pull a biography of Sir Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890) off my to-be-read shelf, where it has sat since 1990. I originally bought it because I was writing my dissertation on the way the definition of the Orient changed over time with increasing exposure to the non-Western world and Burton was…

Read More

Madame Lenormand’s Fortune Telling Cards

Back in February I spoke at the Civil War Museum at Kenosha, Wisconsin, as part of their annual Civil War medicine weekend. I was a featured speaker, but the heart of the weekend was the 17th Corps Field Hospital–a Civil War reenactment unit from the Midwest that “heals the sick and treats the wounded ‘Under…

Read More