From RICHARD MARRIOTT
I found Lance Fogan’s claims of Shakespeare’s medical knowledge unconvincing
(‘The neurologist of Avon’, 20 January). Of the many references he quotes,
only three show the inside knowledge of the specialist. The vast majority
are merely descriptions of symptoms that are open for all to observe. We
can all appreciate Lafeu’s ‘Mine eyes smell onions.’ To say Shakespeare
‘links the sense of smell with the autonomic nervous system’ no more enhances
Shakespeare’s genius than do the Eng Lit folk who call the same effect synaesthesia;
such jargon only obscures a simple and effective leap of the imagination.
As for the porter’s observations of the more notorious effects of alcohol,
Timon’s of syphilitic symptoms, Shakespeare’s of senility in King Lear;
accurate, vivid, imaginative, but evidence of great life, not great learning.
It is not so much what he sees, but what he makes of what he sees that should
impress us.
Richard Marriott Newcastle upon Tyne
