Jan Bondeson is a Swedish-born rheumatologist, scientist and author, working as a senior lecturer and consultant rheumatologist at the Cardiff University School of Medicine

Cardiff University School of Medicine

Cardiff University School of Medicine was founded in 1893 when the Departments of Anatomy, Physiology, Pharmacology, Pathology, Bacteriology were founded at University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire , in the same year. Students finishing their preclinical studies at Cardiff went on to...

. Outside of his career in medicine, he has written several nonfiction books on a variety of topics, such as medical anomalies and unsolved murder mysteries. In a 2003 interview, Bondeson told Publishers Weekly

Publishers Weekly

Publishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...

, "I've always had a profound interest in history, especially the history of medicine, and a bit of a fancy for the macabre and odd." Jan Bondeson is the biographer of the London Monster, a predecessor of Jack the Ripper who stabbed fifty women in the buttocks, of Edward 'the Boy' Jones, who stalked Queen Victoria and stole her underwear, and Greyfriars Bobby, the little Scottish dog.

Career

Jan Bondeson attended medical school at Lund University, Sweden, and qualified in 1988. He became a specialist in rheumatology and internal medicine, and defended his PhD thesis in 1996. He was awarded several scolarships to continue his scientific career at the renowned Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology in London. He became a pioneer of the experimental use of adenoviral gene transfer to study intracellular signalling, and investigate the regulation of important cytokines and matrix metalloproteinases. In 2000, he was promoted to become senior lecturer and consultant rheumatologist at Cardiff University, doing a mixture of clinical work, teaching and research. Here, his research has concentrated on the role of synovial macrophages in osteoarthritis, and regulation of degradative enzymes in this disease. Jan Bondeson has more than seventy publications in refereed scientific journals, and continuing research grant support from the Arthritis Research Campaign.

Writing

Jan Bondeson has also written a series of books in the areas of the history of medicine and zoology, and some studies about curious historical episodes. His Cabinet of Medical Curiosities was published in 1997. His book Buried Alive, a historical study of the signs of death, and the risk of being prematurely buried by mistake, was supported by a scholarship from the Wellcome Trust

Wellcome Trust

The Wellcome Trust was established in 1936 as an independent charity funding research to improve human and animal health. With an endowment of around £13.9 billion, it is the United Kingdom's largest non-governmental source of funds for biomedical research...

. The London Monster tells the story of a Welsh artificial flower maker who was convicted (or perhaps rather framed) for a series of stabbings of London women between 1788 and 1790. The Great Pretenders (2003) is a study of historical cases of disputed identity, like the Lost Dauphin of France, Kaspar Hauser and the Tichborne Claimant. Queen Victoria’s Stalker (2010), tells the story of Edward 'the Boy' Jones, a weird teenager who became obsessed with the youthful Queen Victoria, and broke into Buckingham Palace to stalk her.

In 2011, Jan Bondeson published Amazing Dogs, a cabinet of canine curiosities about the cultural history of dogs. The same year, he published Greyfriars Bobby, the Most Faithful Dog in the World, a thorough biography of Greyfriars Bobby

Greyfriars Bobby

Greyfriars Bobby was a Skye Terrier who became known in 19th-century Edinburgh for spending 14 years guarding the grave of his owner, John Gray , until he died himself on 14 January 1872...

, supposed to have kept vigil on its master's grave for fourteen long years. Original sources, and newly discovered illustrations, are made use of to re-interpret the story of Greyfriars Bobby completely, and to describe the pan-European myth of the 'Dog on the Master's Grave' and the many other cemetery dogs at large in Victorian times.

Selected works

• The Prolific Countess, Stichting oud Loosduinen 1996. Dutch translation.
• A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities, Cornell UP 1997 [out of print]/ WW Norton pkb 1999. Japanese, Spanish and Portuguese translations.
• The Feejee Mermaid and Other Essays in Natural and Unnatural History, Cornell UP 1999. Spanish translation.
• The Two-Headed Boy and Other Medical Marvels, Cornell UP 2000. Chinese translation.
• The London Monster: A Sanguinary Tale, U Penn Press 2000. US pbk by Da Capo Press 2002. UK reissue in 2003 by History Press / pbk 2005.
• Buried Alive: The Terrifying History of Our Most Primal Fear, WW Norton 2001 / 2002 pbk in print. German, Dutch and Spanish translations.
• The Great Pretenders: The True Stories behind Famous Historical Mysteries, WW Norton 2003 / 2004 pbk in print. Japanese translation.
• The Pig-faced Lady of Manchester Square [revised UK version of Two-headed Boy], History Press 2004 / pbk as Freaks in 2006.
• Blood on the Snow: The Killing of Olof Palme, Cornell UP 2005. Danish translation.
• The Cat Orchestra and the Elephant Butler [revised UK version of Feejee Mermaid], History Press 2006 / pbk as Animal Freaks in 2008.
• Queen Victoria's Stalker, Amberley Pub & Kent St UP 2010.
• Amazing Dogs: A Cabinet of Canine Curiosities, Amberley Pub & Cornell UP 2011.
• Greyfriars Bobby, the Most Faithful Dog in the World, Amberley Pub 2011.

External links

• Jan Bondeson. Cardiff University School of Medicine