Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: John Donne

  • Book review: Island Dreams: Mapping an Obsession

    Arpan K. BanerjeeSolihull, United Kingdom Gavin Francis is a Scottish doctor, author, and traveler who has worked in emergency medicine, family medicine, and as the resident doctor for the Antarctic survey, which resulted in a previous book. His wanderlust and way with words have been favorably compared to the late Bruce Chatwin. Island Dreams: Mapping…

  • Sir Geoffrey Langdon Keynes

    JMS Pearce East Yorks, UK   Fig 1.  Sir Geoffrey Langdon Keynes. Reproduction after a pencil drawing by G. Shaw, 1957. Credit: Wellcome Collection.  (CC BY 4.0) Mention the name Keynes in Britain and most people think of the Buckinghamshire town Milton Keynes or the celebrated twentieth-century economist John Maynard Keynes. In the thirteenth century…

  • Margaret Edson’s W;t: lessons on person-centered care

    Atara Messinger Toronto, Ontario, Canada     “She slips off her bracelet. She loosens the ties and the top gown slides to the floor.” American playwright Margaret Edson’s 1998 play W;t has been described as “ninety minutes of suffering and death mitigated by a pelvic exam and a lecture on seventeenth-century poetry.”1 When W;t was…

  • Ending one’s life on the stage

    Angela Belli New York City, New York, United States   Writers and physicians often share the same sensibilities and skills required to describe the disease process and its wider effects. But while the literary artist, unlike the physician, relies on his imagination to realize the experience of his fictional characters, he can also engage the…