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Ds 1018
Ds 1018
in the 19th
century, heir to an English peerage, and had an extra face on the back of his head. The duplicate face could not see, eat or speak out loud
but was said to "sneer while Mordake was happy" and "smile while Mordake was weeping". [1] Mordake repeatedly begged doctors to have his
"demon face" removed, claiming that it whispered things that "one would only speak about in hell" at night, but no doctor would attempt it.
According to the legend, Mordake committed suicide at the age of 23.[1]
Contents
1Earliest reference
2In Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine
3In popular culture
4See also
5References
6External links
Earliest reference[edit]
The first known description of Mordake is found in an 1895 Boston Post article authored by fiction writer Charles Lotin Hildreth.[2] The article
describes a number of cases of what Hildreth refers to as "human freaks", including a woman who had the tail of a fish, a man with the body
of a spider, a man who was half-crab, and Edward Mordake. Hildreth claimed to have found these cases described in old reports of the
"Royal Scientific Society". It is unclear whether a society with this name even actually existed. Hildreth's article was not factual and was
probably published by the newspaper as fact simply to increase reader interest. [3]
In popular culture[edit]
Mordake has been the subject of various texts, plays, and songs:[5]
Mordake is featured as the "2 Very Special Cases" on a list of "10 People with Extra Limbs or Digits" in the 1976 edition of The Book of
Lists.[6]
Tom Waits wrote a song about Mordake titled "Poor Edward" for his album Alice (2002).[7]
In 2001, Spanish writer Irene Gracia published Mordake o la condición infame, a novel based on Mordake's story.[8]
A US thriller film entitled Edward Mordake, and based on the story, is reportedly in development. An intended release date has not
been provided.[9]
Three episodes in the FX anthology series American Horror Story: Freak Show, "Edward Mordrake, Pt. 1", "Edward Mordrake, Pt. 2",
and "Curtain Call", feature the character Edward Mordrake, played by Wes Bentley.
A short film based on the story of Mordake entitled Edward the Damned was released in 2016.[10]
The Two-faced Outcast is another novel about Edward Mordake, originally written in Russian in 2012–2014 and published in 2017 by
Helga Royston.[11]
Canadian metal band Viathyn released a song called "Edward Mordrake" on their 2014 album Cynosure.[12]