The blackboard anatomist

Since the early 19th century blackboard teaching has been an important practice in medical schools, building on the work of celebrated artistic anatomists such as London’s Charles Bell.1 I was lucky enough to be taught by another great blackboard anatomist, Peter Lisowski. As first year medical students at the University of Tasmania we would enter his lectures with only a blank blackboard in front of us—no printouts or PowerPoint slides. In a shaking but precise hand he would start to draw, …