Short Fiction · Chapter
My Medical Career explained
The narrator recounts his unconventional medical career, beginning with a scheme to run a filling station and restaurant on a highway while secretly practicing medicine.
What happens
The narrator recounts his unconventional medical career, beginning with a scheme to run a filling station and restaurant on a highway while secretly practicing medicine. He then moves to Chicago, where he rents an office in a dangerous area and profits by holding shooting victims in a silo for rewards. Finally, he sets up a tent in Grant Park, performing tonsillectomies on lunchtime patrons. The chapter ends with his contemplation of marriage and a witty exchange with Dr. Flip.
Themes in this chapter
Satire of Media and Business
The narrator's medical career is a satirical take on entrepreneurship and the exploitation of customers, from the roadside filling station to the tent surgery in the park.
Disillusionment and Failure
Despite his schemes, the narrator's profits are minimal, and his patients often give fake names, reflecting a cynical view of success and human nature.
Characters to notice
- Roach
A fifteen-year-old boy hired for four dollars a week, who had a horror of water and was so dirty that customers became ill upon seeing him, prompting them to seek the narrator's medical help.
- Hi Fever
A boy selling subscriptions to Risky Stories, who calls on Mrs. Tweek and learns her husband has been absent for months, illustrating the chaotic Chicago of the time.
- Mrs. Tweek
A woman who is unaware of her husband's prolonged absence, thinking he might have gone to a show months ago, highlighting the era's marital neglect.
- Dr. Flip
A friend consulted about marriage, who wryly replies that he wishes he had only thought about it, not actually married.
Key passages
“Most young doctors make the mistake of hanging out their shingles in large or small cities where there are already more medicos than can earn a comfortable living.”
Many new doctors err by setting up practice in places already saturated with physicians, making it hard to earn a living.
The narrator criticizes conventional medical career choices, setting up his own unconventional path.
“The only trouble with my plan was that my patients treated me as they would their own doctor and did not pay cash, but asked me to send them my bill, and invariably they gave me fictitious names and addresses.”
The flaw in his scheme was that patients didn't pay upfront, requesting bills sent to fake names and addresses, so he rarely collected fees.
This highlights the theme of disillusionment and the failure of his business model.
“I was now nineteen years of age and thinking of getting married. I consulted a friend of mine, Dr. Flip. “Dr. Flip,” I said, “I was thinking about getting married.” “I wish I had,” was his reply. “What? Got married?” “No,” he said. “Just thought about it.””
At nineteen, the narrator considers marriage and asks Dr. Flip for advice. Dr. Flip says he wishes he had only thought about it, not actually married.
This exchange satirizes marriage, suggesting that the idea is better than the reality.