Showing 21 - 30 of 56 annotations contributed by Chen, Irene

Lady Lazarus

Plath, Sylvia

Last Updated: May-17-2006
Annotated by:
Aull, Felice
Chen, Irene

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

A 30 year-old woman describes with chilling power her three suicide attempts. She compares herself to a cat with nine lives and to a concentration camp victim; yet "dying / is an art . . . / I do it exceptionally well." The doctors/men that save her are the enemy, and she warns them to "beware."

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Talking to the Family

Stone, John

Last Updated: Jun-25-2004
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene
Aull, Felice

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

The physician prepares himself to deliver the news of a death to a family. His white coat symbolizes this role in his professional life; and when he takes it off at home, he becomes only a man with chores to do around the house. Yet that chore, replacing a lightbulb, seems to symbolize rebirth and the sustenance derived from personal life which allows the physician to continue in his often difficult role.

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Death

Stone, John

Last Updated: Jun-25-2004
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene
Aull, Felice

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

The author has witnessed both prolonged dying, occurring "slowly as rust"; and sudden, unexpected death, as "find[ing] the doorknob come loose in his hand."

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Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night

Thomas, Dylan

Last Updated: Jan-24-2003
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene
Aull, Felice

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

A son beseeches his elderly father to fight, rather than accept, death: "Do not go gentle into that good night." He gives examples of how "wise men," "good men," "wild men," and "grave men" "rage against the dying of the light," and begs his father to do the same.

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A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London

Thomas, Dylan

Last Updated: Jan-24-2003
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene
Aull, Felice

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

The author begins by avowing that he would never "mourn the majesty and burning of the child's death." He expresses the utter inadequacy of mere words to describe any child's passing.

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I'm Gonna Slap Those Doctors

Coulehan, Jack

Last Updated: Nov-11-2002
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

A patient expresses his anger and frustration with the physicians who are treating him. A recovering alcoholic, he feels particularly sensitive to what he perceives as the doctors' self-righteousness, and imagines how he would get even with them.

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What the Doctor Said

Carver, Raymond

Last Updated: Mar-05-2002
Annotated by:
Aull, Felice
Chen, Irene

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry — Secondary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

Words rushing forth in a punctuationless stream, a patient describes how his doctor gives him the bad news of advanced lung cancer, and his reaction to it. There is an almost comical aspect as the doctor struggles to be both factual and sympathetic, and the patient struggles to absorb what he is being told. The doctor asks if the patient is able to find comfort and "understanding" from religion (since, apparently, he is unable to provide them). This triggers a brief poetic flight of fancy in the patient, but then he departs in a state of dazed politeness.

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The Immortals

Borges, Jorge Luis

Last Updated: Mar-05-2002
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene

Primary Category: Literature / Fiction

Genre: Short Story

Summary:

This short story begins with a summary of the tale of Guillermo Blake, who believed that "the five senses obstruct or deform the apprehension of reality." The narrator then relates the tale to his own experience: upon visiting his gerontologist for a check-up, he is informed of a procedure that confers immortality. The "immortals" are reduced to living brains within wooden cubes, their bodies having been replaced by "formica, steel, plastics." The narrator tries not to show his horror, but moves immediately to a different part of the country under an alias.

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The Cancer Match

Dickey, James

Last Updated: Mar-05-2002
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene
Aull, Felice

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

The narrator is a patient with advanced cancer who has come home from the hospital after being told that "medicine has no hope." Yet, for one night, he strives to overcome his cancer with drink, his "Basic Life Force," and hope.

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The Last Words of My English Grandmother

Williams, William Carlos

Last Updated: Mar-05-2002
Annotated by:
Chen, Irene
Aull, Felice

Primary Category: Literature / Poetry

Genre: Poem

Summary:

This is a description of the last moments of the narrator's ailing grandmother. She is "wrinkled and nearly blind," and protests cantankerously as the ambulance speeds her towards the hospital. However, in a sudden change of character, her last words express how tired she is of looking at the passing trees; her loss of interest in the view parallels her loss of interest in life.

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