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Patrick Cockburn
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The Broken Boy Hardcover – September 27, 2005

by Patrick Cockburn (Author)
4.1 4.1 out of 5 stars 21 ratings
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A personal memoir of the last great polio epidemic, affecting 50,000 people, and of the author’s own experience of polio; a portrait of his parents, both radicals; and the story of the epidemic in Cork, Ireland, where the author and his family lived in the mid 1950s.


From the Trade Paperback edition.
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  1. Print length
    320 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Jonathan Cape
  4. Publication date
    September 27, 2005
  5. Dimensions
    5.56 x 1.19 x 8.75 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0224071084
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0224071086
  8. See all details
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4.1 out of 5 stars
21 global ratings

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Top reviews from the United States

  • Eigil Møller
    5.0 out of 5 stars Thanks for the story. Very enlightening!
    Reviewed in the United States on August 28, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    This book was a kind of revelation to me. I am affected by the polio disease just like mr. Cockburn and am about the same age. I got the disease when I was about one year old (the Copenhagen 1952 epidemic), so my memories are at some points different from the author here, but apart from that, there are many similarities and shared experiences. So it was an eyeopener for me. Just as mr. Cockburn, I have tried for most of my life just to ignore and put the experience behind me, and tried to live a normal life and forget about all the 'cripple'-stuff. But of course the truth is sneaking up on you, and - as he writes - there always is that awareness, that you're different and so on. So, better confront it!

    I've avoided memories and historical accounts until now (for the above reasons) but found it very enlightening to read Cockburns very well researched tale of the Cork epidemy. I got a lot of answers to questions I never asked, and it feels good to get some explanations and to know, that there's a bunch out there with similar experiences.

    On top of that, we learn about the VERY interesting family of Cockburn (at least half of the book: all the middle chapters) and their life as anglo-irish AND as radical forces in their day. For me it was very entertaining and enlightening to read about that stuff. Fascinating and important lifes. Patrick Cockburn is a journalist, that I hold in very high regard, and who writes so absolutely brillant (understated and factual, but none the less extremely subversive), with great analytic skill and with the 'reality-base', his sources,100 per cent in place. So, it was an unexpected bonus (from reading his recent, brillant ISIS-publication) that I found out about this book concerning our shared history - and the family and social history behind it. Thanks for the story!
    5 people found this helpful
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  • Síle
    4.0 out of 5 stars Broken Boy
    Reviewed in the United States on September 9, 2012
    Verified Purchase
    Delighted to receive almost-new copy of The Broken Boy. Pity the posting brings the cost up from $0.08 to about EURO16 but still glad to have it.
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  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars History of Cork Polio Epedimic
    Reviewed in the United States on January 28, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    Well written, great insight into Cork and Ireland of the 50's.
    Good explanation of the nature and spread of polio and the issues around the development and roll-out of the vaccine.
    3 people found this helpful
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  • mschwindt
    3.0 out of 5 stars Polio in Cork
    Reviewed in the United States on December 3, 2006
    The author, who contracted polio at age six, was one of many victims of the polio epidemic in Cork,
    Ireland. Over 50,000 got the virus in 1956, "one of the last great outbreaks of
    polio anywhere in Western Europe." An outbreak that occurred just a few years
    after a vaccine had been developed in America.

    The book is interesting when it describes the way that the community denied
    and downplayed the effects of epidemic. Newspapers, then still the main source
    of information in Ireland, never named polio victims and only published, more or
    less uncritically, official reports on the epidemic. This, and apparently, the
    desire of the business community to maintain economic stability in the
    community, created an environment of incoherent hysteria where children
    were kept home from school and public swimming pools closed, but pubs
    remained opened.

    Patrick Cockburn, a distinguished international news correspondent, was
    gravely affected by the disease. Today, he walks with a limp, cannot run or
    drive a car. He tells quite a bit of his days in hospital and feelings at the time.

    He seems, though, a bit reticent about it at times, because it was so long ago and also
    perhaps because of a resentment at his parents moving house to Cork, despite
    warnings about the epidemic.

    His parents were Claud and Patricia Cockburn. His father was a leftist writer
    and his mother a daughter of Anglo-Irish upper-class parents. Both were
    adventurous and neither were accustomed to changing their plans if risks were
    involved. Much of the book, perhaps too much, is written about his parents and
    their background. For those readers of Alexander Cockburn, Patrick's brother,
    this family background is very familiar ground.

    Well-written and interesting in places, this is a slight contribution to the
    literature on diseases and epidemics. Cockburn laments the lack of information
    on polio epidemic in Cork, so perhaps this is spadework for another, larger
    book. For those who are interested in epidemics in general, Cockburn points to
    a classic account, Journal of a Plague Year by Daniel Defoe.
    8 people found this helpful
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  • T. Porges
    4.0 out of 5 stars Polio
    Reviewed in the United States on January 18, 2007
    I had polio, about the same in immediate and long-term effect as Cockburn, at about the same time. The reason for the reticence the earlier reviewer notes is that at that time we were all bombarded by images of kids in iron lungs, and by encouraging stories about other little boys and girls who'd had polio or other crippling diseases and accidents (the miler Glenn Cunningham was a teacher favorite) and who'd gone on to greatness of one kind or another.

    Part of that message was that if we weren't going to be cheerful overachievers we should at least have the grace to shut up about it, since so many others (the coffin kids) had it so much worse. To be a polio survivor is to know absolutely that whatever you may think you deserve, there's another kid in the ward who deserves much more; however great you think you are there's another kid who's better. It screws me up at job interviews but otherwise makes me a better person than I might otherwise be -- though not, as noted, as good as Patrick Cockburn, most likely.

    This is a good book. A nice comparison read would be Wilfrid Sheed's _People Will Always Be Kind_.
    6 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Roger F. Alsop
    5.0 out of 5 stars Ireland in the 50s
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 12, 2015
    Verified Purchase
    It was fine. It told me more about his father Claud who I didn't use to like. I can remember his work in 'Private Eye'. It seemed lightweight to me. But this book told me more about him as a man. I could see that he took fatherhood seriously which I admired.
    I was also conscious of the author's bravery. He dealt with polio very well. He also tangentially mentioned his journalistic work in Baghdad which I also thought was very brave.
    Finally he can't drive (which I can't either).
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  • C. Bratcher
    4.0 out of 5 stars The pandemic that was
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 30, 2020
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    A moving account of the author's being struck down with polio in the Cork NI epidemic of 1955/6. Interesting in its depiction of small town Ireland then, but most so in the parallels with the reactions to Covid 19 - the clash between local Medical Officers of Health needing to tell it as it is, and local shops and tourism wanting to downplay it, producing 'half-cock' mixed messages that damaged trust. The book falls short of '5 star' because it is overly repetitive in places.
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  • Ms. Mary R. Westwood
    5.0 out of 5 stars Polio Epidemic
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 30, 2017
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    Very well written and a good historical record of this area of Ireland and the polio epidemic
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  • Ann
    2.0 out of 5 stars A family history tale
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 23, 2012
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    I've only read half this book and am struggling to keep going. I thought it would be about the boy with polio but so far most of it is about the author's family going back to the 1800s. It's fairly tedious and hard going. I read this author's other book written with his son and found it excellent so this is a bit of a disappointment.
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  • Anthony Garrick
    5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 4, 2015
    Verified Purchase
    A reallly interesting book and full of informaiton of the polio outbeark in Cork mid 50's
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