Pandora's Baby
How the First Test Tube Babies Sparked the Reproductive Revolution
Book • 2006
Robin Marantz Henig's Pandora's Baby traces the early history of in vitro fertilization and related reproductive technologies, focusing on the scientists, patients, controversies, and ethical debates that shaped the field.
The book chronicles key figures and events from 19th-century artificial insemination through the scientific race of the 1960s and 1970s that produced the first IVF babies.
Henig examines how medical ambition, social anxieties, and limited oversight produced both breakthroughs and ethical quandaries.
She places IVF in broader cultural and moral contexts, showing how reactions to the technology reflected deep concerns about reproduction, family, and the manipulation of life.
The narrative combines reportage, historical research, and interviews to explain how IVF transformed family-making and opened debates that continue with newer technologies like cloning and gene editing.
The book chronicles key figures and events from 19th-century artificial insemination through the scientific race of the 1960s and 1970s that produced the first IVF babies.
Henig examines how medical ambition, social anxieties, and limited oversight produced both breakthroughs and ethical quandaries.
She places IVF in broader cultural and moral contexts, showing how reactions to the technology reflected deep concerns about reproduction, family, and the manipulation of life.
The narrative combines reportage, historical research, and interviews to explain how IVF transformed family-making and opened debates that continue with newer technologies like cloning and gene editing.
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Robin Marantz
IVF: An Interview with Robin Marantz
