Eugenics: The Poem

The eugenics movement from the late 1880s through the mid-1930s enlisted medicine to marginalize those persons deemed defective, subjecting them to institutionalization and involuntary sterilization. The social attitudes behind the movement were captured 200 years before by a 17th century French physician-cleric, Claude Quillet, in a lengthy poem about how a society could produce "beautiful" children. While poetry is an important element in the medical humanities for developing empathy, it may also illuminate the parti pris of social change.