Cognition and Recognition: On the Origin of Movement

This book throws a penetrating light on the life and work of the physiologist turned neurologist G.G.J. Rademaker against the background of flourishing clinical research in the Netherlands of the early twentieth century. It charts the rise and fall of the branch of experimental neurophysiology of which Rademaker was a master, which was transmitted from Charles Sherrington in England to Rudolf Magnus at Utrecht and then to Rademaker, Magnus’s most talented pupil. Reaching its apogee in the 1920s and 1930s, it was replaced after World War II by other less invasive approaches. This biography is a fitting memorial to a man who, though somewhat neglected in his own land, was recognised as a genius by his peers worldwide.