Review of Obesity: The Biography

The dustcover of Obesity: The Biography shows a painting by Benjamin Marshall of a famously obese Englishman, Daniel Lambert. When he died in 1809, at the age of thirty-nine, he was five foot one inch in height and weighed 739 pounds. Sander L Gilman records that a wall had to be demolished in order to remove him from his room (3). He notes that he 'came to represent the freakish nature of fat'--he was apparently recommended as a sightseeing stop if you were visiting London--but he was also described as a temperate eater and drinker, perhaps as an affectionate rather than accurate observation. The brief story of Mr. Lambert is a human touch and an interesting one in an otherwise frustratingly uneven text that lacks cohesion. Gilman writes in detail about the people through history who wrote on the body and its size, and all the likely influences upon it, and how attitudes and approaches to weight changed. These influences could be both external, such as culture and religion, or internal, such as matters of self-discipline, or mental or physical illness. Some of these writers were obese themselves, and wrote autobiographical accounts of their struggles with weight control, detailing their hypotheses on diet and exercise.   Continued at Metapsychology Online Reviews.