Customer Reviews

Eat Thy Neighbour: A History of Cannibalism

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Eat Thy Neighbour is nothing if not engaging. From the lurid detail of a Goya painting of Saturn devouring one of his children on the dust jacket to the details of case after case of cannibalism, the book is a romp through the history of anthropophagy (the scientific name for humans eating human flesh). Unfortunately, this not a topic in which one ought to romp. The first and lesser of two problems with the book is that the tone is entirely unsuitable to the subject matter. The authors seem positively to delight in the most graphic aspects of the cases they survey, and the chapter titles, after the useful distinctions and measured tone of Part One, begin to descend into the depths of puns and sly asides: "Keeping it in the Family: Sawney Beane," "The Proof of the Pudding is in the Tasting: Margery Lovett and Sweeney Todd," "A Hunger for Adventure: Alfred Packer," and so on.

The second, and greater, offense is the authors' failure to distinguish between myth and hearsay on the one hand and actual evidence of cannibalism on the other. Time and again, they accept secondhand rumors at face value. While there is a place in history for secondhand rumors, they need to be identified as such. Diehl and Donnelly accept, for example, that the Aztecs ate all of their human sacrifices, without noting that the source for this story is a priest who arrived in Mexico more than a decade after the Spanish had imposed their own rule, and without noting that evidence of human sacrifice and evidence of cannibalism are hardly the same. They also accept as fact the testimony of sailor Hans Staden, whose account of South American cannibalism was uncorroborated and suspect. They offer a note of caution with regard to the tale of Sawney Beane, admitting that the evidence for his existence is slight, but then cheerfully accept the historicity of Sweeney Todd on the basis of (according to the bibliography) exceedingly slight evidence.

Their credibility is further damaged by simple factual errors and omissions. For example, the extremely well documented case of the Medusa, a ship that ran aground in 1816, is misrepresented. The most shocking aspect of the case was that the captain and many of the better-connected passengers sailed away in the ship's boats (though the ship itself, damaged, remained largely intact on its sandbank for years), leaving about 150 stranded on a makeshift raft constructed mostly of the ship's masts. Only 15 of these people survived until rescue, and only by consuming the flesh of the dead. Evidence abounds in this case: there were court records, newspaper accounts, and the published memoirs of those who survived. The raft later became the subject of a celebrated painting by Gerricault, who interviewed survivors and even had a scale model of the raft constructed so that he could study it better. A diagram of the raft was even published. With all this evidence, and with the raft the central focus of so much discussion, it seems incredible that the authors could summarize the incident by stating that the ship "foundered and sank" and that "More than 150 survivors clung desperately to an intact section of the vessel's hull." Such basic failure to acquaint themselves with well-known facts calls the authors' credibility into question across the board.

This product treats anthropophagy thoroughly with wit and a sense of humor. It's one of the most in-depth books on the subject I've found so far. The first few chapters are a historical basis for the practice of cannibalism and the last half contains entertaining specifically documented accounts of the practice in "civilized society" since the 1600's.

This book is not a 'history of cannibalism'. It is chronologically arranged, but that's as close to 'history' as it gets: it's a clutter of sensationalistic, editorialized retellings of gruesome crimes, masquerading as popular scholarship. Practically useless except when 'America's Most Wanted' isn't on television and you want a dose of the same canned, grim yet faux-shocked voice.

By reading this delightful book about a truly undelightful practice. Usual societal mores view eating the flesh of another human as distasteful, not an easy topical read, and a difficult subject matter for some to swallow (poor puns intended).

How best to examine the scattered historical records of what we now see as such abberant behavior? With a grain of salt, perhaps, as have these authors, as evidenced by their chapter titles, and by the occasional humorous nuance found in their recounting of known occurrances of cannibalism.

We don't know when homo sapiens gave up such primitive behaviors, but we do know through evidence found by reputable archaeologists that prehistoric man often consumed his fellow man. These days, we don't often eat the children during a difficult winter, as we did eons ago. Here, in this book, we learn of some sometimes startling consumptive events in humanity's relatively recent past.

I found this compendium of known incidences of cannibalism to be interesting, well presented, and am pleased that someone took the time and effort to make all these tales available between two covers.

A good and entertaining read.

someone already brought this point up, but this is not a history. its an examination of isolated cases in which cannibalism was not socially accepted, and not a very good examination at that... there is some abstract on the history, but not much. the first few chapters were promising, but it was all downhill after the author wrote something along the lines of "... these deviants will be our close companions for the remainder of the book", referring to the likes of jeffrey dahmer, ed gein, et al. also, when examining the Issei Sagawa case, the author speaks of japanese societys' borderline condonance of the incident - "this is a sad and disturbing comment on the continuing Japanese attitude towards the west" - and i thought to myself, "that was a sad and disturbing comment on the continuing western attitude of cultural and moral superiority towards the east/anywhere but the west"

i was upset that he completely overlooked the Fore people of Papau New Guinea, and he didnt examine the diseases associated, historically, with cannibalism

i purchased the book in a bookstore because it captured my eye immediately, there is not much literature on this subject matter, and the author took advantage of that. i feel betrayed and mislead. nonetheless, as stated in the title of this review, i was entertained - thoroughly. it was quite hard to put the book down. but! buyer beware! its not a history!!

Diehl and Donnelly's book, "Eat Thy Neighbour", starts out with a brief history on cannibalism. Tying in the probabilities as to why some people chose to eat...other people and why some people were simply forced by their own inclination to survive, the authors offer a wide variety of reasons why men and women historically (and currently) cross one of the last human taboos.

Historical aspects of tribal anthropophagy are mentioned and the book starts out as a kind of anthropological adventure into the past. The reader is then brought up to the past 200 years and individual chapters on various cannibals are revealed in lurid detail. This is not faint-hearted reading. Unless you can detatch yourself from the victims and have a solid stomach, you may not appreciate some of the reports (some of which are pieced together from personal confessions).

I have read other material on cannibalism in the past, and while I felt this to be more a book that focused on individuals, rather than the general topic of cannibalism, it would still be a good starting point if you are interested in this kind of history and/or subject. I gave it five stars for keeping me turning the pages. If I could, I'd mark it 3 or 4 for the content.

I read this book in 2 days - it had a lot of interesting information about the subject. I also liked how every chapter was either a different time period in history or a different individual whose story was discussed. If you are looking for something unlike a history book but still informative - this one was great.