Tag: Literary Essays
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The new pandemic
Maite Losarcos Navarra, Spain Photo by Bruno Feitosa on Pexels. It is just another day. The traffic light is red as pedestrians cross the street before you, always in a hurry. At last, the light turns green, but just as you prepare to start the car, the world goes white. People shout, cars honk,…
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“No one should approach the temple of science with the soul of a money-changer”: Who said it first?
Robert Schell Brooklyn, New York Biblical inspiration: Christ Driving the Money-Changers from the Temple (or The Purification of the Temple). El Greco, c. 1600, Frick Collection. Via Wikimedia. Public domain. In these days of rampant biomedical commercialization, the Bible-inspired admonition “No one should approach the temple of science with the soul of a money-changer”…
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Baudelaire’s spleen
Nicolas Roberto Robles Badajoz, Spain Figure 1. Frontispiece of the 1857 proof of Les Fleurs du Mal, annotated by Charles Baudelaire. Gallica Digital Library. Via Wikimedia. Public domain. Je suis comme le roi d’un pays pluvieux, Riche, mais impuissant, jeune et pourtant très-vieux, Qui, de ses précepteurs méprisant les courbettes, S’ennuie avec ses chiens…
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The Joys of Motherhood: The classic Nigerian novel
Oyenike Ilaka Albany, New York Cover of The Joys of Motherhood, published in London, UK, by Allison & Busby in 1979.2 The Joys of Motherhood is a Nigerian novel written by Buchi Emecheta in 1979. Emecheta was a Nigerian woman from the Igbo tribe. Born in 1944, she spent her childhood in Lagos. At…
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Wandering lonely as a cloud
Dean Gianakos Lynchburg, Virginia, US Photo by K. Mitch Hodge on Unsplash. I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o’er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils; Beside the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the…
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The ordeal of Evelyn Waugh
Stephen McWilliams Dublin, Ireland Evelyn Waugh. Courtesy of National Portrait Gallery. In Evelyn Waugh’s second-last novel, The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold (1957), the eponymous character experiences some singular and troubling symptoms. Mr. Pinfold is a successful writer, not unlike Waugh himself, who embarks on a sea voyage in an effort to cure the chronic…
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Dr. Mikhail Bulgakov and morphine
Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden Centers for Disease Control Public Health Image Library. Public domain. “During the years of war and revolution it was hard to find a hospital without morphine-addicted patients.”1 – Vladimir Gorovoy-Shaltan, physician specialist in addiction medicine Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov (1891–1940) was a Russian physician, novelist, and playwright. He earned his…
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Samuel Pepys: Stones and groans
Samuel Pepys. Portrait by John Hayls, 1666. National Portrait Gallery, London. Via Wikimedia. Public domain. I polished up that handle so carefully That now I am the ruler of the Queen’s Navy – HMS Pinafore, Gilbert and Sullivan Introduction Samuel Pepys (1633–1703) did not polish doorknobs to rise in the world. He was…
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Jane Eyre and tuberculosis
Afsheen Zafar Rawalpindi, Pakistan I had just put down my pen after the last patient left the room. She somehow reminded me of the Brontë sisters. She had been diagnosed with tuberculous axillary lymphadenitis after a biopsy but otherwise seemed to be in perfect health. Apparently she was not much disturbed by the diagnosis…