Summary

Chapter 6 begins with the story of British Engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel who, in 1843, accidently swallowed a coin while trying to do a magic trick for his children. The coin lodged at the base of his trachea, and he knew if it moved just slightly it would choke him. Brunel became famous as doctors and engineers tried to devise ways to dislodge the coin. He dislodged the coin himself by creating a contraption in which he swung upside down. Bryson starts with the story to illustrate how important our mouths are and, he says, places of peril. “Indeed it can reasonably be said that we are built to choke,” he writes (93). Bryson then discusses a number of scientific mysteries associated with the mouth and throat such as the tonsils. Swallowing is actually a complex, complicated system that people...