The Origin of the Cantankerous Cook, Crowtho, Revealed: A Beyond Event Horizon Tidbit
A round and unforgiving man, pronounced by heavy features - rough and unkempt even with standard Potemkixian grooming - bore an expression all dull and detestable, having been raised in the strict Potemkixian regime. He stood there with ladle in one hairy hand. His folded arms tightened when his large disapproving eyes caught sight of the three lagging cabin mates entering. A prominent and typical sneer stretched across his callous face, distorting him more unrefined than his already stagnant state permitted. Ugly was too generous, vile was too much, such marked a man resigned to a world of his occupation as cook. -- Chapter 2, Beyond Event Horizon
The inspiration of many characters in Beyond Event Horizon extended from real men typically involved with Bethlem Hospital. Crowtho was no exception. Based on the the chief surgeon Brian Crowther - a rather unconventional if not macabre man fascinated with death rather than life who carried on his rather abhorrent and entirely illegal activities as the hospital doctor for twenty years - Crowtho received his cantankerous nature from my interpretation of his most malignant model counterpart. Though more benign in action, the ship's cook still inherently keeps to his own unapologetic manner and facet of life, much like Dr. Brian Crowther.
Source cited: Madhouses, Mad-Doctors, and Madmen: The Social History of Psychiatry in the Victorian Era -- edited by Andrew Scull
