Laughing Death

1. Front Matter

   Pages N1-x

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2. The Island and I

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 1-18

3. The Threshold

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 19-56

4. Martial People with Dignity

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 57-98

5. Denizens of the High Valleys

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 99-126

6. The Mountains Fretted with Evil Spell

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 127-160

7. Cheerful Optimism

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 161-196

8. Opening the Pathway to Kuru Research

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 197-228

9. Pioneers Against the Dreaded Scourge

   • Vincent Zigas

   Pages 229-264

10. Meandering Pathways of Kuru Research

    • Vincent Zigas

    Pages 265-310

11. Epilog

    • Vincent Zigas

    Pages 311-312

12. Back Matter

    Pages 313-319

    PDF

It has been a difficult, sometimes painful, story to tell in its entirety, but I have done my best to be accurate both in facts and in dates, for I feel that l owe the truth to the many who have become valued acquaintances, and sometimes friends. All these have constantly requested more news of my "Green Dwelling" and my discovery of a fatal neurological disease previously unknown to Western medicine. This book is for them, in lieu of letters that I ought to have written and did not. It is also my concern to produce innocent amusement, unrestricted by canon or precedent, for those who require some relaxation from the fatigue generated by so many parasitic forms of life in this less than perfect world.

My peers, the medical scientists, who read this will realize that this book is neither a scientific treatise, nor a balance-sheet of all the achievements and failures of medical science, but a presentation of the major implications of the factors that continually determine our medical ethics - including some of the less prizeworthy drawbacks. 

• Kuru
• death
• drama
• irony
• parody
• writing
• literary diction

[A] swashbuckling romance of heroic adventure....A poetic description of the terrain and the inhabitants....Evocative...exquisite images of life in New Guinea ....A romantic account of the heroic age of medicine....Zigas enjoys the theatricality of an arresting story....An attention-getting style of writing....His appreciative description of one of his... assistants might well apply to himself: "a great actor, an innocent liar of the most magnificent proportions, and hence very good entertainment." -The New York Times

Policies and ethics