The first biography of John Hunter for 25 years and the most comprehensive ever, The Knife Man reveals the remarkable world of this eighteenth-century pioneer who honed his skills on bodies stolen from graveyards, collected exotic animals from around the world and anticipated evolutionary theory in advance of Darwin.

 Revered and feared in equal measure, John Hunter was the most famous surgeon of eighteenth-century London. Rich or poor, aristocrat or human freak, suffering Georgians knew that Hunter’s skills might well save their lives – but if he failed, their corpses could end up on his dissecting table, their bones and organs destined for his macabre museum. Maverick medical pioneer, adored teacher, brilliant naturalist, Hunter was a key figure of the Enlightenment who transformed surgery, advanced biological understanding and even anticipated the evolutionary theories of Darwin. He provided inspiration both for Dr Jekyll and Dr Dolittle.  But the extremes to which he went to pursue his scientific mission raised question marks then as now.