The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron

The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron - Paperback

$17.95
$17.95
Skip to product information
The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron
  • The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron
The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron - Paperback

The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron - Paperback

by Roger Shattuck
$17.95
$17.95

Book Overview

The true story of the nineteenth century's so-called "Wild Boy of Aveyron"--an abandoned French child who lived for years alone in the wilderness before being brought under the care of an innovative young physician.

"Before dawn on January 9, 1800, a remarkable creature came out of the woods near the village of Saint-Sernin in southern France." So begins Roger Shattuck's book about the so-called Wild Boy of Aveyron--a child abandoned by his caretakers and captured, years later, while scavenging food from a garden. Unable to speak, he was sent to the National Institute for the Deaf in Paris, declared a hopeless case, and left to languish.

One day, however, Jean Itard, a young medical student from the provinces, took notice of the boy. Itard began to spend time with him, and soon the two found ways to interact. With games and toys Itard engaged the boy's senses and imagination, developing methods of education (some of which went on to form a basis for special education and the Montessori method) that brought him out further. For a while Victor--as Itard named him--made progress, but soon it stalled. Isolated behind institutional walls, the boy lived out the rest of his life a stone's throw from the Luxembourg Gardens.

The Forbidden Experiment tells the story of a tragic young man and the extraordinary doctor who tried, however imperfectly, to help him. It is a story of compassion, like the case studies of Oliver Sacks--a figure whom Itard foreshadows. It is also a story that leads Shattuck to ask deep questions about the human animal: What is language, how do we acquire it, and what do we become if we are deprived of it?
ISBN9781681379777
Author Roger Shattuck
PublisherNew York Review of Books
GenreBiography, History, and Self-help & personal development
FormatPaperback
PublishedAugust 2025
LanguageENG- English
Pages256
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Biography & Autobiography History Nonfiction Psychology

1% fer Each of the Seven Seas

Every purchase sends 7% of our profits to The Ocean Cleanup. No fine print, no opt-in — just how we sail.

Whoever Ye Be, Welcome Aboard

Queer lit, music, art, philosophy, fiction — stories for every kind of soul. Come as ye are, matey.

More by Roger Shattuck

The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron

The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron - Paperback

The Forbidden Experiment: The Story of the Wild Boy of Aveyron - Paperback

By Roger Shattuck

About Roger Shattuck

Roger Shattuck (1923-2005) was born in New York City, studied at Yale, and taught at the University of Texas at Austin, the University of Virginia, and Boston University. A frequent contributor to The New York Review of Books, he was the author of The Banquet Years, The Innocent Eye, Forbidden Knowledge: From Prometheus to Pornography, and Marcel Proust, which was awarded the National Book Award in 1975. His book The Forbidden Experiment (2025) and his edition of Helen Keller's The World I Live In (2004) are published by NYRB Classics.

You may also like