Visiting the hospital for the syphilitic, or, Literature in the face of (late-nineteenth- to early- twentieth-century) venereal peril

In 1900, syphilis was considered a health scourge imperiling the demographics of Western nations. The relative ineffectiveness of the available treatments was an impetus for innovative prevention initiatives, including the publication of antivenereal novels aimed at the general public and, as early as the 1910s, health education films. These pages are devoted to what is at stake in the pertinent scene in these fictions, namely the visit to the hospital for the syphilitic.