Susan Wise Bauer's The Great Shadow is an informative and lively survey of the history of illness and of humanity's attempts to combat it. Though much of her account traces the progress that's been made from times when sickness was thought to be a punishment from angry gods, and when society was essentially helpless to fight deadly diseases, embedded in that story is a serious cautionary tale that will temper one's enthusiasm for the belief that medicine can cure what ails us.
Bauer (The Story of Western Science), who holds a PhD in American Studies, is a fluid writer who brings to this project the useful background of an intelligent, curious generalist. The Great Shadow proceeds in roughly chronological fashion, launching most chapters with attention-grabbing stories--like a description of Edward Jenner's daring first smallpox vaccination--to set the stage for a discussion of broader developments in science and medicine.
The task of recounting the history of more than 12 millennia of humanity's struggle with serious illness and death, including terrifying stories of pandemics that outstrip Covid-19 by many orders of magnitude, is daunting, but Bauer handles it skillfully. If she had written her book 50 years ago, it almost certainly would have ended on a note of triumph. But in her concluding chapter, Bauer delves into the rise of a new category of antibiotic-resistant infections, and the many disconcerting responses to the Covid-19 pandemic and how it mirrored those of earlier, far less enlightened eras. The Great Shadow will help anyone gain perspective on some of the critical public health challenges of the 21st century. --Harvey Freedenberg, freelance reviewer