I’m reading “The Emperor of Maladies” – this new book is a psycho-socio-historical story of cancer and Cancer. The book is being heavily reviewed right now and everyone in Cancer Land is going to cringe a little or a lot. Those of us who love in the time of cancer will also be nodding and crying but cheering too.
The author Mukherjee –an oncologist--is able to break down the language, culture, economics and the politics of cancer.
From the review in November 8 2010 New Yorker magazine:
“But it’s hard to wage a war against a poorly defined enemy. If the enemy (cancer) doesn’t define itself, then you can configure the enemy you need for the war that you want to fight. That’s what happened with the war on cancer. It gave definite form, Mukherjee says, to an adversary that was essentially formless.”
“Cancer --a disease of colossal diversity—was recast as a single monolithic entity. In this way the War on Cancer resembles less the war on Nazi Germany than the War of Terror.”
In fact it is simply that: a war on terror. The war on cancer is designed to increase our fear of mortality, our fear of death and ultimately our fear of life.
Showing posts with label warner. Show all posts
Showing posts with label warner. Show all posts
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Beautful Swimmers
Beautiful Swimmers by William Warner is one of my favorite books. It’s is the story of the watermen on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and their counterpart, the blue crab.
It’s all here: how the crab lives, feeds, courts, mates, dies and is eaten. And how the waterman trains, dresses, plans, thinks, prays, eats, and yes, dies. These two --the crabs and the watermen-- are wonderfully and positively co-dependent.
Two of my favorite words in the English language come from Beautiful Swimmers: Autotomy is the remarkable crustacean attribute of dropping a limb, allowing a pincher or leg to fall away as a means of exiting a battle or a threatening situation. Autogeny is the related and accompanying attribute referring to a crab’s ability to grow a new limb to replace the one sacrificed for survival. I could not, the first time I read this, or now, years later, miss the comparison to humans. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to know when to drop something or someone and just walk away, and yes, to also be able to naturally grow that part of oneself again, to make a choice and to be new again?
It’s all here: how the crab lives, feeds, courts, mates, dies and is eaten. And how the waterman trains, dresses, plans, thinks, prays, eats, and yes, dies. These two --the crabs and the watermen-- are wonderfully and positively co-dependent.
Two of my favorite words in the English language come from Beautiful Swimmers: Autotomy is the remarkable crustacean attribute of dropping a limb, allowing a pincher or leg to fall away as a means of exiting a battle or a threatening situation. Autogeny is the related and accompanying attribute referring to a crab’s ability to grow a new limb to replace the one sacrificed for survival. I could not, the first time I read this, or now, years later, miss the comparison to humans. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to know when to drop something or someone and just walk away, and yes, to also be able to naturally grow that part of oneself again, to make a choice and to be new again?
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