Happy man. The story of a village doctor

First published in 1967, this fictional exploration of the life of a doctor in rural Gloucestershire is a masterpiece of nonfiction. This is a collaborative work that combines text by Booker Prize winner John Burger (1926–2017) with photographs by Swiss documentarian Jean Maur (1925–2018) in a series of superb analytical, sociological and philosophical reflections on the role of the doctor, the roots of cultural and intellectual deprivation and motives that underlie the activities of the “Zemstvo doctor”. The essay, which became revolutionary for its time and relevant half a century later, serves as a monument to an almost forgotten medical practice, free from the commercialization of the disease and the depersonalization of the patient, where a doctor who seeks to look into the soul of a patient in order to understand and alleviate his suffering can be called a “happy person.”