Lunar Chronicles: Belief and Bodies in Pain
In this highly personal piece Deepsikha Dasgupta recounts the intersection between lunar phases and the arthritic pain experienced by women in her family.
The Last Breath Society (Coughing Coffin)
Playwright and filmmaker Ash Kotak reviews Martin O’Brien’s performance installation ‘The Last Breath Society (Coughing Coffin)’. Deciding to go to ‘The Last Breath Society (Coughing Coffin)’ at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, created
‘Encountering Pain’: Book Review
‘What is this thing called pain?’ Katharine Cheston reviews a new edited volume which sets out to explore this question.
Review of Communicating Pain: Exploring Suffering through Language, Literature and Creative Writing
How do we convey an experience of pain to others? This question – which has long fascinated scholars in the medical humanities – is addressed in a new book, reviewed here by Susanne Main. Communicating Pain
ILLNESS: A Narrative in Four Parts (Part Four)
Gillian Shirreffs uses poetry, prose and white space to explore lived experience of a chronic neurological illness. This is part four of an essay published in four parts this week. Click here for part
ILLNESS: A Narrative in Four Parts (Part Three)
Gillian Shirreffs uses poetry, prose and white space to explore lived experience of a chronic neurological illness. This is part three of an essay published in four parts this week. Click here for part
ILLNESS: A Narrative in Four Parts (Part Two)
Gillian Shirreffs uses poetry, prose and white space to explore lived experience of a chronic neurological illness. This is part two of an essay published in four parts this week. Click here for part
ILLNESS: A Narrative in Four Parts (Part One)
Gillian Shirreffs uses poetry, prose and white space to explore lived experience of a chronic neurological illness. This is part one of an essay published in four parts this week. Click here for part
Subject-Verb-Object: Writing with and about Multiple Sclerosis
Gillian Shirreffs reflects on using writing to manage chronic pain – and to renegotiate the objectifying medical gaze.[1] As an erstwhile student of English Language and a former Secondary School English teacher, the relationship
Reflections on Representing Pain: Narrative and Fragments
Chronic pain is in a state of representational crisis. That was how Sara Wasson opened the symposium, ‘Representing Pain: Narrative & Fragments’ at Lancaster University in August. Part of Wasson’s AHRC-funded network, Translating Chronic