The Ghost Map

by

Steven Johnson

Sir Benjamin Hall Character Analysis

Sir Benjamin Hall was the president of the General Board of Health during the 1854 cholera epidemic; he was also a firm believer in the miasma theory of disease, like his predecessor, Edwin Chadwick. Hall was a dedicated, deeply sincere crusader for public health, but because of his devotion to the false theory of miasma, he arguably did more harm than good in his capacity as president. Hall commissioned endless studies into the cholera epidemic, but by asking the wrong questions about cholera, he guaranteed that the Board would receive misleading answers.

Sir Benjamin Hall Quotes in The Ghost Map

The The Ghost Map quotes below are all either spoken by Sir Benjamin Hall or refer to Sir Benjamin Hall. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Illness, Death, and the Unknown Theme Icon
).
Chapter 7 Quotes

Hall's list is a kind of straitjacket for an eventual document. You can tell from just scanning the instructions what kind of document they will ultimately produce: a rich and impossibly detailed inventory of the smells of Soho circa 1854.

Related Characters: Sir Benjamin Hall
Page Number: 165
Explanation and Analysis:
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The Ghost Map PDF

Sir Benjamin Hall Quotes in The Ghost Map

The The Ghost Map quotes below are all either spoken by Sir Benjamin Hall or refer to Sir Benjamin Hall. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Illness, Death, and the Unknown Theme Icon
).
Chapter 7 Quotes

Hall's list is a kind of straitjacket for an eventual document. You can tell from just scanning the instructions what kind of document they will ultimately produce: a rich and impossibly detailed inventory of the smells of Soho circa 1854.

Related Characters: Sir Benjamin Hall
Page Number: 165
Explanation and Analysis: