Hands corrected

Hand surgeon James Chang became obsessed with the deformities evident in Rodin's hand sculptures. Now he teaches a class

in which students pick one of Rodin’s hands, diagnose the problem, and develop a surgical plan to correct it. The course is extremely popular, and Chang says he’s been fascinated by the reasons students are drawn to it. “One woman was a butcher’s daughter, one was the organist for the Stanford Chapel,” he said. “I had a baseball player from Stanford who was interested in the mechanics of grip, and a student who was partially paralyzed and wanted to learn more about his condition.”