The Cape doctor A novel

Levy's remarkable debut novel is based on the life of the nineteenth-century physician Dr. James Miranda Barry, who began life as a woman, Margaret Bulkley. Desiring to become a doctor, Margaret is frustrated that women are not admitted to medical school. Spurred on by a family friend, she assumes a male persona, naming herself Jonathan Mirandus Perry ("I would become a boy at age fourteen"), is successfully admitted to medical school in Edinburgh and graduates with notable excellence to become a military surgeon. Following several brief posts, he is sent to Cape Town where he meets Governor Lord Somerton. The two become close friends, and, when Somerton discovers Jonathan's secret, lovers. When Jonathan (Margaret) becomes pregnant, however, things change dramatically. Ah, but how? Levy has done an absolutely superb job of novelizing Barry's life while her realization of him as a character is flawless. He is brilliant, impetuous, unafraid (perhaps foolishly) of making enemies in a good cause, an ardent supporter of women's rights and an equally ardent enemy of slavery. The relationship between Jonathan and Lord Somerton is remarkable in its presentation and sometimes bittersweet development. And the book is beautifully written ("The shimmering sea, like poured silver in the sunlight"). It is, in sum, an unforgettable work of art that deserves raves. Bravo!

Levy (Love, in Theory) delivers an elegant and provocative spin on the life of trans icon James Miranda Barry. Jonathan Mirandus Perry, born Margaret Brackley in Cork, Ireland, in 1795, attends medical school, serves in the British Army, and later joins the household of Lord Charles Somerton in South Africa as his personal physician, where the two men become close. After Somerton becomes seriously ill, Perry becomes careless about keeping up his masculine attire and Somerton discovers his secret. They become lovers for a time, and here Levy provides rich insights on the effects of men's desire ("To be the object of a man's fierce desire felt intoxicating, bracing and wounding all at once. A power most women know from girlhood, but which I never had, having become a boy before I ever became a woman"). Perry then becomes pregnant and secretly travels to Mauritius to give birth, and the baby is whisked away to adoptive parents. While many trans advocates and allies will take issue with Levy's feminist framing of Perry's story (and, indeed, some already have), which involves Perry referring in his narration to his past self "Margaret" as "she," Perry's narration brims with fascinating details about medicine and social mores of the time. This beautifully written work will spark much debate. (June)

Historical fiction from the award-winning author of Love, in Theory (2012). During his career as a physician with the Royal Army, James Miranda Barry served at various posts throughout the British Empire. He gained renown not only for improving the health care received by soldiers, but also for demanding better living conditions for enslaved people, prisoners, lepers, and the mentally ill. When he died in 1865, it was revealed that he had female genitalia. At the time, Barry was popularly characterized as a woman masquerading as a man or as a hermaphrodite. Contemporary activists and some historians, though, have claimed him as a transgender hero, noting that he lived his entire adult life as a man and took pains to conceal his body from scrutiny upon death. The tension between these two ways of categorizing Barry illustrates why this novel became controversial before anyone had read it, when Levy described her protagonist as "a heroine for our time, for all time." Levy points out that her work is fiction--in a move that is likely to assuage no one, she has given her character the name Jonathan Mirandus Perry--but she also insists that she "read and researched [Barry] for years," according to The Guardian, and rejects the idea that we can retroactively apply concepts like transgender to historical figures, which will sound to some like claims of authority. Her Dr. Perry does not come to realize that he's a man; instead Perry adopts a new name and puts on a boy's clothes in order to get an education and lives as a man because he refuses to accept the limitations inflicted on women. Perry refuses a marriage proposal from his friend and benefactor--he learns Perry's secret--and even hides the birth of their child in order to maintain his public persona and continue his work. The relationship between Perry and Lord Somerton takes up a substantial part of the novel; indeed, it often reads like a Regency romance written by a "literary" author. Levy uses language with care, and there are some beautiful scenes here--particularly those that show Perry discovering his vocation. Describing human dissection, he muses, "The body was not…profaned by examination, as if one were cross-examining God, but honored by attention. Love, all love, is attention." Artfully written but more likely to attract attention for its subject than its author's craft. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.