Book Summary: The Ghost Map
Summary: The book The Ghost Map is set in 1854 when a disease called cholera broke out in England, again as it had before, starting in the 1830’s. The book mainly focuses on the two million plus people residing in London. The people in London didn’t know what was causing this disease at first, but as the book progresses we find out that it’s caused when you ingest water contaminated with feces. This book takes you through the struggles and havoc that the disease caused among the people and their ultimate understanding and solution. The author begins the book by describing the lower class or ‘scavengers’ in London, which consists of night-soil men, among others. The author discusses how these men who have the foulest job were very important …show more content…
This is shown through the organization of the topics he discusses, his word choice, and the way he represents the facts that contribute to the story. The book is written in third person limited point of view, This can be assumed because the author never says ‘I’ or ‘we’ he always refers to specific characters by their name and only states known facts, no opinions or feelings that he may have. This was beneficial to the book because it allows the author, Steven Johnson, to tell all aspects of the story in full, rather than just one person’s vantage point of the events in 1854. The Ghost Map got many good reviews including a terrifyingly realistic one from Entertainment Weekly, “Johnson brings to nightmarish, thought-provoking life a world in which a swift but very unpleasant death can be just a glass of water away.” This review brings the illness, figuratively, right up to your doorstep. People read about illnesses or such things and think that it’ll never happen to them so why worry, when in reality it could be uncomfortably easy for you to be in the same situation. Another review, that was extremely positive, from Kirkus Reviews, “In addition to telling the story of the outbreak, Johnson offers mini-lessons on related topics: how cholera kills, how Victorian London dealt with its messes, how and why people cling to false theories. Lively and educative.” Shows that not only is this an interesting book about the Cholera outbreak in London of 1854, but it’s also a book full of small facts about some interesting little details provided by the author to help assist in the depth of the book. The Ghost Map also got an amazing review from USA Today, which said,” Johnson builds suspense in detailing the intersecting quests of Dr. John Snow and young clergyman Henry Whitehead to find the source of the illness as it strikes the city’s population. Johnson is interested not only in how groundbreaking theories
Summary Of Identity In Peeled By Joan Bauer
274 Words | 2 PagesThe surroundings shape who Hidley the main character in the book becomes. She is a reporter and people are dying and getting injured. The reporters think it is because of Old Man Ludlow’s ghost. I know this because in the text it says “Another Local Girl Injured By Ludlow’s Ghost”. This means that Hidly might grow up sooner than kids that live in an easy going area.
Why Was Charles Town Difficult To Settle?
611 Words | 3 PagesOne of the diseases talked about in this document are small pox. In Document E it states, “ A great cloud seems at present to hang over this province…”. What this quote means that small pox are covering the town and people are getting sick and some leaving. Smallpox was a disease that made it hard to settle Charles Town because it spread throughout the settlement at got the settlers sick and some also died, and also the Native Americans. The Native Americans were not introduced to this disease until they came.
Fever 1793 By Laurie Halse Anderson
497 Words | 2 PagesYour mother is stranded,your town has become a ghost town and pestilence is roaming . In 1793 the state of Philadelphia battled against a deadly enemy,deadly yellow fever . It took the lives of 5,000 citizens . Matilda’s story may have been fiction however for many people this was very real . In the novel “Fever 1793” by Laurie halse Anderson, Matilda finds herself struggling with the fever.
The Spread Of The Cholera Epidemic In Montreal
1232 Words | 5 PagesCholera was a feared disease that attacked a range of countries from every part of the world. It brought about a sense of horror due to its horrendous symptoms and relatively high mortality rate. This fear was no less apparent for the inhabitants of Philadelphia especially after reports were written about towns such as Montreal and Quebec. One particular report written by the “Commission” (Samuel Jackson, Chas. D. Meigs, and Richard Harlan) and appointed by the “Sanitary Board of the City Councils” had a purpose of providing information about the cholera epidemic in Canada for the inhabitants of Philadelphia.
Typhoid Mary: Captive To The Public's Health Summary
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Social Class In The Turn Of The Screw
766 Words | 4 PagesDue to the scientific work of the Society for Psychical Research, the Victorian ghost story had started to take shape. The SPR solicited ghostly encounters to the public, giving authors the access they needed to write effective eye-catching ghost stories for public consumption. In addition to the scientific research being done in London, the class system started to change. Social Classes: During the middle to the end of the 1800s suburban building in London surged, rents lowered and housing became more affordable for those in the lower class.
Reasons Why the Bubonic Plague was Devastating to European Society
850 Words | 4 PagesIn the text it states that, “And those who were responsible for the dead carried them on their backs in the night in which they died and threw them into the ditch, or else they paid a high price to those who would do it for them” (Document 4). This goes to show that many people feared carrying the dead knowing that they might catch the disease themselves. This spread the infection to people trying to dispose of their families corpses. The amount of bodies piled up and up forcing them to: “put layer on layer just like one puts layers of cheese in a lasagna” (Document 4).
Review Of Fever 1793 By Laurie Halse Anderson
499 Words | 2 PagesIn 1793 a fever infected Philadelphia that killed 10% of its population. The book Fever 1793 by Laurie Halse Anderson is a historical fiction from a young girl named Matilda’s perspective. The book is about her experience dealing with the Yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia. She learned many lessons and one of them was that fear can control you. Some of the reasons fear can control you is how it can make you leave what you know, it can make you turn on people, and it can make you vulnerable.
Quotes From The Ghost Map
1820 Words | 8 PagesThe Ghost Map Part One: Preface 1. What was the main point of the reading? (at least one in-text quote required) - In this first part of the book we are introduced to many key characters and terms that play a big role throughout the rest of the book. We are taken back to London in the year of 1854.
Analysis Of Matthew Lewis The Monk And Ann Radcliffe's The Italian
1270 Words | 6 PagesMatthew Lewis’ The Monk and Ann Radcliffe’s The Italian are two of the most iconic Gothic novels of the Eighteenth Century, both written only a year apart and one in response to other. It is of no surprise that both novels have various subjects in common—one of these, the Supernatural. Ghostlike forces, specters, demons and locations are approached differently in The Monk and The Italian, one uses the supernatural deliberately—and in a much larger role—while the other uses the supernatural to heighten certain scenes of terror. Certainly, both novels use it as a shock factor, but furthermore both use it for different reasons in their novels.
Death's Acre Summary
745 Words | 3 PagesAll the way to tracking serial killers, to studying a cow 's dead body to determine way of death. To much surprise this book goes into great details of everything, sometimes more than wanted Topic 1 The whole reason for Death 's Acre being written is cause of the infamous Body Farm. Other from being well known from The Blind Side, the Body Farm is notoriously known for its
Irony In My Brother Sam Is Dead
1204 Words | 5 PagesHe died almost exactly the same as Life, on a British ship, infected by Cholera and
Use Of Figurative Language In Laurie Halse Anderson's Fever 1793
720 Words | 3 PagesLaurie Halse Anderson’s historical fiction novel, Fever 1793 takes place in colonial Philadelphia, during the time of the yellow fever outbreak. Mattie Cook, a young girl during the outbreak has to cope with the many hardships brought onto her by the disease. While the fever brought many terrible things to Mattie and her family, she is able to move past them and build her life up again. By using character development and figurative language, Anderson is able to create the theme that good things can always come out of something bad. The theme that prevails throughout the novel Fever 1793 is that good things can always come out of something bad.
Thesis For The Ghost Map
566 Words | 3 PagesThe “The Ghost Map” is a book written by Steven Johnson. In the book, the author explains to us why urban planning is necessary to prevent deadly diseases, such as the deadly cholera outbreak. In 1854, Cholera seized London with incredible force. A capital of more than 2 million people, London had just become as a one of the first modern cities in the society. But lacking the foundation necessary to sustain its dense population - garbage extraction, clean water sources, sewer systems - the city has grown to be the ideal breeding ground for a terrifying epidemic no one understands how to cure.
Joy Harjo's Poem 'A Map To The Next World'
1138 Words | 5 PagesIt Was Never About the Map For many years now, extremist conspirators have believed that the world is going to end, and everyone will perish. However, one poet has a more positive outlook, “A Map to the Next World” by Joy Harjo illustrates the fall of man and the birth of a better world. Symbolism about ancient civilization, modern day society, and her hopes for the future in her poem are used to emphasize that humanity should work towards a restored future. Harjo keeps referring to a map in her poem, but a map was not meant for the creator of that map to use.
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