Acclaimed personal writing from one of our most outspoken essayists, on disability, on family, on being an impolite woman, and on the opportunities and gifts of a difficult life.

Groundbreaking perspectives on disability in culture and the arts that shed light on notions of identity and social marginality

Presents a series of personal essays concerning the author's life and her experiences with death, including the sudden death of her father, her mother's lingering illness and death, and her own suicide attempt.

Medical imaging technologies can help diagnose and monitor patients' diseases, but they do not capture the lived experience of illness. In this volume, Devan Stahl shares her story of being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis with the aid of magnetic resonance images (MRIs). Although clinically useful, Stahl did not want these images to be the primary way she or anyone else understood her disease or what it is like to live with MS. With the help of her printmaker sister, Darian Goldin Stahl, they were able to reframe these images into works of art. The result is an altogether different image of the ill body. Now, the Stahls open up their project to four additional scholars to help shed light on the meaning of illness and the impact medical imaging can have on our cultural imagination. Using their insights from the medical humanities, literature, visual culture, philosophy, and theology, the scholars in this volume advance the discourse of the ill body, adding interpretations and insights from their disciplinary fields.