Illness as Metaphor and AIDS and Its Metaphors - Softcover

Sontag, Susan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0312420137 ISBN 13: 9780312420130

Publisher: Picador USA, 2001

Synopsis

In 1978 Susan Sontag wrote Illness as Metaphor, a classic work described by Newsweek as "one of the most liberating books of its time." A cancer patient herself when she was writing the book, Sontag shows how the metaphors and myths surrounding certain illnesses, especially cancer, add greatly to the suffering of patients and often inhibit them from seeking proper treatment. By demystifying the fantasies surrounding cancer, Sontag shows cancer for what it is--just a disease. Cancer, she argues, is not a curse, not a punishment, certainly not an embarrassment and, it is highly curable, if good treatment is followed.

Almost a decade later, with the outbreak of a new, stigmatized disease replete with mystifications and punitive metaphors, Sontag wrote a sequel to Illness as Metaphor, extending the argument of the earlier book to the AIDS pandemic.

These two essays now published together, Illness as Metaphor and AIDS and Its Metaphors, have been translated into many languages and continue to have an enormous influence on the thinking of medical professionals and, above all, on the lives of many thousands of patients and caregivers.

About this title

Review:

"Susan Sontag's Illness as Metaphor was the first to point out the accusatory side of the metaphors of empowerment that seek to enlist the patient's will to resist disease. It is largely as a result of her work that the how-to health books avoid the blame-ridden term 'cancer personality' and speak more soothingly of 'disease-producing lifestyles' . . . AIDS and Its Metaphors extends her critique of cancer metaphors to the metaphors of dread surrounding the AIDS virus. Taken together, the two essays are an exemplary demonstration of the power of the intellect in the face of the lethal metaphors of fear." --Michael Ignatieff, The New Republic

From the Back Cover:

'One of the most liberating books of our time' Newsweek

When diagnosed with breast cancer Susan Sontag discovered the extent to which we have developed a mythology to cope with disease, which can often distort the truth about illness and isolate the patient. In Illness as Metaphor she stripped away the myths and presented the true significance of disease as it has affected cultures throughout the centuries. AIDS and Its Metaphors extended her critique to examine the metaphors surrounding AIDS and to expose the truth, free of guilt, shame and fear.

'Whatever Sontag writes is passionate ... hers is the satirist's pity for our ignorance and folly' Jonathan Keates, Observer

'An exemplary demonstration of the power of the intellect in the face of the lethal metaphors of fear' Michael Ignatieff, New Republic

About this edition

• Publisher: Picador USA
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0312420137
• ISBN 13: 9780312420130
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 192