a b c d e Devlin, Hannah (22 June 2018). " 'Irish giant' may finally get respectful burial after 200 years on display". The Guardian. Mantel, who is of Irish-Catholic descent, is something of a modern-day Jonathan Swift. She is preoccupied with tortured political relations, particularly relations between England and Ireland. Like Swift, Mantel often employs a savage satire to draw attention to political ineptitude and social injustice. Every Day Is Mother's Day (1985) and Vacant Possession (1986) were fiendish send- offs of the British welfare system. The Giant, O'Brien recalls Swift's Gulliver's Travels in its use of the human form as a metaphor for the body politic.

The Giant, O’Brien – HarperCollins Publishers UK

a b Daley, Jason. "Why the Skeleton of the "Irish Giant" Could Be Buried at Sea". Smithsonian . Retrieved 12 December 2021. Gina Kolata (5 January 2011). "Charles Byrne, Irish Giant, Had Rare Gene Mutation". The New York Times . Retrieved 6 January 2011. And there the bones remained, studied in 1909 by the renowned American surgeon Harvey Cushing, who removed the top of the skull and pronounced that Mr. Byrne had had a pituitary tumor. His skeleton was on display at the Hunterian Museum in London from 1799 until it was removed from public display in 2023. The BMJ article was widely reported and the resulting swell of public support for the campaign forced The Royal College of Surgeons to formally consider whether it should release Byrne's skeleton, the showpiece of their Hunterian Museum, in February 2012. They decided to continue the exhibit. [17]Mantel grew up ensconced in a vast extended family. And what she chiefly remembers is: Talk. "My grandmother and her eldest sister lived next door to each other. My abiding image -- from the time I was two and three and four years old -- is of my aunts on either side of the fireplace. They'd be sitting and talking -- people, people, stories, stories -- punctuated with these kind of refrains. How should transplantation legislation account for the legal rights of the human corpse? - Research Portal, King's College, London". kclpure.kcl.ac.uk . Retrieved 28 January 2023. From the author of Wolf Hall, Bring Up the Bodies and The Mirror & the Light, comes the true story of the 18th Century Irish giant, Charles O’Brien, who was exhibited in London and eventually dissected by the surgeon John Hunter. Lowth, Mary (11 May 2021). "Charles Byrne, Last Victim of the Bodysnatchers; the Legal Case for Burial". Medical Law Review. 29 (2): 252–283. doi: 10.1093/medlaw/fwab008. PMC 8356664. PMID 33975345– via Oxford Academic. A few days ago the Hunterian Museum announced the decision to remove Charles Byrne from display. I have been watching the case for many years. It’s a fascinating story which was retold by Hilary Mantel in her excellent book ‘The Giant O’Brien’ published in 1998.

The Giant O’Brien – And Did Those Feet The Giant O’Brien – And Did Those Feet

Among those whose attention was drawn to London’s latest wonder was the anatomist John Hunter. Driven – even possessed -- by a deep curiosity about unusual bodies and preoccupied by scientific studies of human malformation Hunter became obsessed with procuring Byrne’s body for his anatomical collection, whatever the cost. Under permanent surveillance from Hunter’s spies, Byrne, a stout Catholic, began to fear for his soul and afterlife. Indeed Byrne was so afraid that Hunter would dissect his corpse that on his deathbed requested to be buried at sea. a b Muinzer, Thomas (2013). "A Grave Situation: An Examination of the Legal Issues raised by the Life and Death of Charles Byrne, the "Irish Giant" ". International Journal of Cultural Property. 20: 23–48. doi: 10.1017/s094073911200046x. S2CID 159516940. When I read that book, The Hidden Ireland, this feeling of exile and loss and displacement grew in me rapidly. A void opened and I had to look for some voices to fill it."Muinzer, Thomas L. "Why a London museum should return the stolen bones of an Irish giant". theconversation.com. So, a step forward as he is no longer the subject of the public gaze. But in this case we absolutely know that Byrne did not want to be the property of the medical establishment. My own feeling is that he should be given his last wishes and be buried at sea. At school, teachers considered Mantel somewhat dull, perhaps because she was generally very quiet. But she loved stories, especially tales of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. The story reads like an allegory or a macabre fairy tale. Mantel contrasts two cultures: Irish and English, and two types of knowledge, science, and poetry. She divides the world into two distinct periods: future and past. In The Giant O'Brien the present is fleeting, elusive. With The Giant, O'Brien, Mantel again locates her muse in 18th- century politics. The story is set largely in England and based nominally upon two historical figures, the giant Irishman Charles Byrne, and John Hunter, a Scottish anatomist. Mantel calls her titan Charles O'Brien and it is 1782 when he decides to exchange a life of poetry in Ireland for a career in London as the tallest man in the world.

The Irish Giant: Charles Byrne, my uncle and Hilary Mantel - BBC The Irish Giant: Charles Byrne, my uncle and Hilary Mantel - BBC

Mantel describes The Giant O'Brien as a bookend to her story of the French Revolution. They explore many of same political themes, such as what it means to be human, the idea of the body politic and the condition of exile.

The Story

Chahal, Harvinder S.; Stals, Karen; Unterländer, Martina; Balding, David J.; Thomas, Mark G.; Kumar, Ajith V.; Besser, G. Michael; Atkinson, A. Brew; etal. (2011). " AIP Mutation in Pituitary Adenomas in the 18th Century and Today". The New England Journal of Medicine. Massachusetts Medical Society. 364 (1): 43–50. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa1008020. hdl: 10871/13752. PMID 21208107. Byrne in a John Kay etching (1784), alongside the Brothers Knipe, and Andrew Bell, Baillie Kid, James Burnett ("Lord Monboddo") and William Richardson The skeleton of the 7ft 7in (2.31m) tall Byrne displayed at the Royal College of Surgeons of England in London (middle of this image) Byrne was living in London at the same time as the pre-eminent surgeon and anatomist John Hunter. Hunter had a reputation for collecting unusual specimens for his private museum, and Hunter had offered to pay Byrne for his corpse. As Byrne's health deteriorated, and knowing that Hunter wanted his body for dissection (a fate reserved at that time for executed criminals) and probable display, Byrne devised a plan. On 2017 Irish songwriter Seamus Fogarty released a song about Byrne - "A Short Ballad for a Long Man", with a video by Kieran Evans. [28]