Heart of the matter

A doctor’s gripping account explores meaning and feeling to add flesh to the bones of anatomical study

Sophie McBain

Until the early 17th century, scientists believed that the heart operated a bit like a lamp, warming blood that had been produced by the liver. In 1616, when the English physician William Harvey corrected this misconception, the audience at the Royal College of Physicians booed him. Why did it take so long for scientists to understand the heart’s real function? One possibility is that until the invention of mechanical pumps, doctors lacked the metaphorical language to describe what the heart does. “The truth of the body is as much about storytelling as it is about anatomy,” the writer and surgeon Gabriel Weston argues in Alive, which she describes as an “ecumenical exploration” of her subject. An English graduate, in her early 20s Weston enrolled in a pioneering programme that encouraged…

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Guardian Weekly (Digital) - 1 Issue, 14 March 2025

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