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Description:
An immersive reading of The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy with reflection on incontinence, caregivers, and existential distress.

Website:
https://anauscultation.wordpress.com

Work:

The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky.

Special arrangements were also made for his stools, and this was a torment to him each time. A torment in its uncleanness, indecency, and smell, in the awareness that another person had to take part in it.

But in this most unpleasant matter there also appeared a consolation for Ivan Ilyich. The butler's helper, Gerasim, always came to clear away after him.

Gerasim was a clean, fresh young muzhik, grown sleek on town grub. Always cheerful, bright. At first the sight of this man, always clean, dressed Russian style, performing this repulsive chore, embarrassed Ivan Ilyich.

Once, having gotten up from the commode and being unable to pull up his trousers, he collapsed into the soft armchair, looking with horror at his naked, strengthless thighs with their sharply outlined muscles.

Gerasim, in heavy boots, spreading around him the pleasant smell of boot tar and the freshness of winter air, came in with a light, strong step, in a clean canvas apron and a clean cotton shirt, the sleeves rolled up on his bared, strong, young arms, and without looking at Ivan Ilyich¾obviously restraining the joy of life shining on his face, so as not to offend the sick man¾went to the commode.

"Gerasim," Ivan Ilyich said weakly. Gerasim gave a start, evidently afraid he was remiss in something, and with a quick movement he turned to the sick man his fresh, kind, simple young face, only just beginning to sprout a beard.

"What, sir?"

"I suppose this must be unpleasant for you. Excuse me. I can't help it. "

"Mercy, sir." And Gerasim flashed his eyes and bared his young, white teeth. "Why shouldn't I do it? It's a matter of you being sick." And with his deft, strong hands he did his usual business and went out, stepping lightly. And five minutes later, stepping just as lightly, he came back.

References:

The Death of Ivan Ilyich: https://web.stanford.edu/~jsabol/existentialism/materials/tolstoy_death_ilyich.pdf

Tolstoy, Leo, The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Other Stories (Vintage, 2010)

Charlton B, Verghese A. Caring for Ivan Ilyich. J Gen Intern Med. 2010 Jan;25(1):93-5.

Lucas V. The death of Ivan Ilyich and the concept of 'total pain'. Clin Med (Lond). 2012 Dec;12(6):601-2.

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E45 Long Neglect Has Worn Away by Emily Bronte

Description:

An immersive reading of Long Neglect Has Worn Away by Emily Bronte with reflection on transience and permeance, tuberculosis and facial maladies.

Website:

https://anauscultation.wordpress.com

Work:

[Long Neglect Has Worn Away] by Emily Bronte

Long neglect has worn away
Half the sweet enchanting smile;
Time has turned the bloom to gray;
Mold and damp the face defile.

But that lock of silky hair,
Still beneath the picture twined,
Tells what once those features were,
Paints their image on the mind.

Fair the hand that traced that line,
“Dearest, ever deem me true”;
Swiftly flew the fingers fine
When the pen that motto drew.

References:

Emily Bronte: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/emily-bronte

Bansal R, Jain A, Mittal S. Orofacial tuberculosis: Clinical manifestations, diagnosis and management. J Family Med Prim Care. 2015 Jul-Sep;4(3):335-41.

Quaranta N, Petrone P, Michailidou A, Miragliotta L, Santantonio M, Del Prete R, Mosca A, Miragliotta G. Tuberculous otitis media with facial paralysis: a clinical and microbiological diagnosis-a case report. Case Rep Infect Dis. 2011;2011:932608.

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Description:
An immersive reading of Tanka and Haiku by Sadakichi Hartmann with reflection on tanka, haiku, and aging.

Website:
https://anauscultation.wordpress.com

Work:

Tanka and Haiku by Sadakichi Hartmann

Tanka IX
Were we able to tell
When old age would come our way,
We would muffle the bell,
Lock the door and go away
Let him call some other day

Haikai IV
Oh, red maple leaves,
There seem more of you these eves
Than ever grew on trees

References:

Tanka and Haikai: 14 Japanese Rhythms (Author’s Edition, 1916): https://www.thehaikufoundation.org/omeka/files/original/007ef74e882c8829c0ec2e7f7eac2f6b.pdf

Sadakichi Hartman: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/sadakichi-hartmann

Sadakichi Hartman: https://aaww.org/sadakichi-hartmann-missing-link/

Tanka: https://poets.org/glossary/tanka

Haiku: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/education/glossary/haiku-or-hokku

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Description:
An immersive reading of A Prayer to the Asvins by Ghosha translated by H. D. Griswold with reflection on physician gods, Gosha, leprosy, praise and gift exchange.

Website:
https://anauscultation.wordpress.com/

Work:
A Prayer to the Asvins
Ghosha translated by H. D. Griswold

Your car, the swiftly-rolling:, circumambient,
To be saluted day and night by worshippers,
Asvins, that car of yours we here invoke,
Just as the name of father, easy to entreat.

Arouse the lovely hymns and make our thoughts to swell,
Stir up abundant riches, — that is our desire ;
Make glorious our heritage, ye Asvin pair ;
Yea, make us for our princes like the Soma dear.

Ye are good luck for her who groweth old at home ;
The slow — yea even the slowest one — ye help him on ;
Ye two are called physicians, healers of the blind,
Yea of the feeble and the one with broken limbs.

I call to you, O Asvins, listen to my cry,
And give your help to me as parents to a son ;
Friendless am I, bereft of relative, and poor,
Save me, O save me from the curse which rests on me.

Upon your chariot ye did bring to Vimada,
To be his consort, Purumitra's lovely maid ;
Came to the weakling’s wife in answer to her call.
And to Puramdhi gave the boon of motherhood.

Unto the singer Kali, who had reached old age,
Ye gave anew the boon of fresh and youthful strength ;
’Twas you that lifted Vandana from out the pit ;
Ye gave to Vispala the power at once to walk.

[...]

Come on that chariot which is speedier than thought.
That chariot, Asvins, which the Ribhus built for you;
On yoking which the daughter of the sky is born.
And from Vivasvat the auspicious day and night.

This praise-song have we made for you, O Asvins,
Have fashioned it as Bhrigus build a wagon ;
Have decked it as the bride is for the bridegroom,
Presenting it to you as our own offspring.

References:

Poem: https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.110065/page/n49/mode/2up

Wendy Doniger. Hindu Myths Penguin Classics 1975

https://chs.harvard.edu/douglas-frame-the-myth-of-return-in-early-greek-epic-6-evidence-for-the-meaning-of-the-indo-european-root-nes/

Cartwright, M. (2016, June 30). Ashvins. World History Encyclopedia. Retrieved from https://www.worldhistory.org/Ashvins/

Rig Veda: http://ancientvoice.wikidot.com/src-rvs:rv10-h30

Hyde, L. (2007). The gift: Creativity and the Artist in the Modern World. Vintage.

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Description:
An immersive reading of Hope by Joseph Zarconi with reflection on hope, goal concordant care, chemotherapy, and patients with young children.

Website:
https://anauscultation.wordpress.com

References:

Zarconi J. Hope. Ann Intern Med. 2024 Apr;177(4):541

https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M23-2289

Feldman DB, Corn BW. Hope and cancer. Curr Opin Psychol. 2023 Feb;49:101506.

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Description:

An immersive reading of On Being Ill by Virginia Woolf with reflection on language, health humanities and bipolar disorder.

Website:

https://anauscultation.wordpress.com

Work:

Excerpts from On Being Ill by Virginia Woolf

Finally, to hinder the description of illness in literature, there is the poverty of the language. English, which can express the thoughts of Hamlet and the tragedy of Lear, has no words for the shiver and the headache. It has all grown one way. The merest schoolgirl, when she falls in love, has Shakespeare or Keats to speak her mind for her; but let a sufferer try to describe a pain in his head to a doctor and language at once runs dry. There is nothing ready made for him. He is forced to coin words himself, and, taking his pain in one hand, and a lump of pure sound in the other (as perhaps the people of Babel did in the beginning), so to crush them together that a brand-new word in the end drops out. Probably it will be something laughable. […] Yet it is not only a new language that we need, more primitive, more sensual, more obscene, but a new hierarchy of the passions; love must be deposed in favour of a temperature of 104; jealousy give place to the pangs of sciatica; sleeplessness play the part of villain, and the hero become a white liquid with a sweet taste—that mighty Prince with the moths' eyes and the feathered feet, one of whose names is Chloral.

References:

On Being Ill: https://www.gutenberg.net.au/ebooks15/1500221h.html#ch3

Bantel C, Sörös P. On pain - Virginia Woolf and the language of poets and patients. Br J Pain. 2021 Nov;15(4):497-500.

Munday I, Kneebone I, Newton-John T. The language of chronic pain. Disabil Rehabil. 2021 Feb;43(3):354-361.

Pett S. Rash Reading: Rethinking Virginia Woolf's On Being Ill. Lit Med. 2019;37(1):26-66.

Dalsimer K. Virginia Woolf (1882-1941). Am J Psychiatry. 2004 May;161(5):809.

Koutsantoni K. Manic depression in literature: the case of Virginia Woolf. Med Humanit. 2012 Jun;38(1):7-14.

Bazin, N. T. (1994). Postmortem diagnoses of Virginia Woolf's 'madness': The precarious quest for truth. In B. M. Rieger (Ed.), Dionysus in literature: Essays on literary madness (pp. 133-147). Bowling Green State University Popular Press.

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Description:
An immersive reading of Sonnet – To Science by Edgar Allen Poe with reflection on sonnets, science, and Greek and Roman mythology.

Website:
https://anauscultation.wordpress.com/

Work:
Sonnet—To Science
By Edgar Allen Poe

Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!
Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.
Why preyest thou thus upon the poet’s heart,
Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?
How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise,
Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering
To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies,
Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?
Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car,
And driven the Hamadryad from the wood
To seek a shelter in some happier star?
Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood,
The Elfin from the green grass, and from me
The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?

References:

Poem: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/48625/sonnet-to-science

Hirsch, E. (1999). How to read a poem: And Fall in Love with Poetry. HarperCollins.

Sonnet: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/70051/learning-the-sonnet

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Description:
An immersive reading of Open Windows by Sara Teasdale with reflection on mobility, pain, trees and wonder.

Website:
https://anauscultation.wordpress.com/

Work:
Open Windows
by Sara Teasdale

Out of the window a sea of green trees
Lift their soft boughs like the arms of a dancer,
They beckon and call me, "Come out in the sun!"
But I cannot answer.
I am alone with Weakness and Pain,
Sick abed and June is going,
I cannot keep her, she hurries by
With the silver-green of her garments blowing.
Men and women pass in the street
Glad of the shining sapphire weather,
But we know more of it than they,
Pain and I together.
They are the runners in the sun,
Breathless and blinded by the race,
But we are watchers in the shade
Who speak with Wonder face to face.

References:

Sara Teasdale: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/sara-teasdale

Ulrich RS. View through a window may influence recovery from surgery. Science. 1984 Apr 27;224(4647):420-1.

Mihandoust S, Joseph A, Kennedy S, MacNaughton P, Woo M. Exploring the Relationship between Window View Quantity, Quality, and Ratings of Care in the Hospital. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2021 Oct 12;18(20):10677.