- Email: [email protected]
An intimate journal
Perspectives
Book An intimate journal In the summer of 2001, I taught a course in literature and medicine to American college students at University College Oxford. I’ve taught this course on many occasions: “a survey of the unique world of medicine as reflected in literature”. For me, teaching in Oxford is a full 6 weeks of unbridled Anglophilia and bibliophilia, with Blackwell’s book shop just two blocks away. My agreeably small class of students and I read widely, from W H Auden to Samuel Beckett, William Carlos Williams to John Donne, John McCrae to the gnomic Emily Dickinson, William Osler to Anton Chekhov to Dannie Abse. None of the writers we’ve studied are alive today, with the exception of Dannie Abse. I’ve known him for many years and he invited me and my class to visit him in London. On our way to the Abse home, we stopped in Hampstead to see the Keats House and pay our respects. I thought of the frightful bright-red haemoptysis that Keats recognised as his “death warrant”; I imagined him pacing the lonely and contagious garden; or reading and writing, house-bound, as he fell hopelessly in love with Fanny Brawne; I even assisted Little John down the drive and saw him off, in my mind’s eye, to the carriage that would take him to the boat that would take him to Rome and to his death. Dannie and his wife, Joan, welcomed us warmly. Over tea and scones, we talked of medicine—some students would soon be in medical school. Dannie answered some questions about Keats, his life and poetry. Then a student, Danielle, asked Dannie if he would read a poem for us. Dannie smiled, saying, “Why don’t you read for us”, and handed her a copy of his poem, White Coat, Purple Coat. The poem concerns the two symbolic coats that physician-writers wear. Danielle did a fine job. Dannie then read a www.thelancet.com Vol 368 September 2, 2006
poem of his called Carnal Knowledge, the title of which belies its subject. It’s not about the sexual act, but about anatomical dissection, the common endeavour of medical students since Vesalius. The poem begins around 1944 during an attack on London by German V-rockets; at the time Dannie was studying medicine at King’s College. The poem records indelible
“Running Late is splendid, hard-earned poetry—and an important addition to Dannie Abse’s literary oeuvre.” elements of the dissection; depicts a memorable service of gratitude for those who gave their bodies to medical science; and ends with a line that echoes Keats: “with my hand, my living hand”. It was a powerful experience to hear Dannie read from his work, as it always is. Born in Cardiff, Wales, in 1923, Dannie Abse’s medical training was completed in 1950 at King’s College, London (his first book of poems came out in 1948). For many years, without skipping a beat—or an iamb—he managed to do both writing and medicine; then gradually he gave up the practice of medicine altogether in exchange for full-time writing. Running Late is his 15th book of poems. Decades ago, writer-friends began to tell me that I should meet Dannie Abse, because he and I were in the same business: both physicians, both writing poems. We finally met face-to-face on a Stone family vacation in England more than 30 years ago. Dannie and I immediately retreated to their lovely garden, talking poems. That first chat has become an enduring conversation, any loose ends sewn together when he was next in the USA or I in England. I was already prepared for sorrow when I received my review copy of
Running Late. And it was there, in the front of the book: “Running Late is dedicated to the memory of Joan Abse who was killed in a car crash on June 13, 2005.” Dannie and Joan had been married for more than 50 years. Running Late is informed throughout by the inevitable intersections of love and loss. Many of the poems, however, seem to have been written before Joan’s death and these tend to modulate the felt sorrow of the reader. Ovid’s Wish combines Dannie’s humour and fondness for classical allusions. The opening lines:
Running Late Dannie Abse. Hutchinson/ Random House, 2006. Pp 80. £9·99. ISBN 0-091-79697-0.
“I’d rather be in hell with one woman than in heaven with all those sexless angels Corinna may deceive me and then we quarrel—but oh what reconciliations!”
Later, Cupid makes an appearance: “Sleep’s a rehearsal for undying Death. There’s time enough for nights of peace. So shoot on, with one eye closed, mischievous boy: let your arrows seek my heart forever.”
Running Late is splendid, hardearned poetry—and an important addition to Dannie Abse’s literary oeuvre. The poet’s “voices”, lyrical, playful, elegant, musical, and heartbreaking, are all present. Postcard to his Wife shows a deft touch, despite the underlying sorrow: “Wish you were here. It’s a calm summer’s day and the dulcamara of memory is not enough. I confess without you I know the impoverishment of self and the Venus de Milo is only stone. So come home. The bed’s too big! Make excuses…”
There are literary precedents for writing to a lost loved one. The actress, Olga Knipper, Anton Chekhov’s wife, continued to write letters to him for a full 2 months after he died. A Marriage, the title poem of Running Late, dates from 2004. The
To find out more about Dannie Abse and to hear him reading one of his own poems, In The Theatre, see The Poetry Archive website http://www. poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/ singlePoem.do?poemId=72.
833
Perspectives
poem recalls the early courtship days of the poet and the woman who was to become his wife. After their secretive liaisons (the landlady’s law was NO VISITORS AFTER 10 PM), he would make “a burglar’s exit”, past the landlady’s dog and “its virtuoso chilling bark:” “I hear its echo still at the front garden gate, down the lamplit street, faint, through the hurrying years to where we are, in sickness and in health, in perdurable love, ageing together, lagging somewhat, slowly running late.”
Dannie Abse has always had a sure sense of how to “close” or end a poem, which is a crucial part of making poems. As you can see, he
most assuredly still has the touch. This is a stunning close to a stunning poem. Dannie Abse’s writing has been prescient, as poetry may sometimes be, especially in his love poems, of which there are many fine examples. A poem of his written 20 years ago makes the point. Condensation on a Windowpane is instantly recognisable as a love poem. The following lines are from that poem, just as the poet writes on the water condensed on the window pane: “My finger squeaks on glass. I write JOAN. I write DANNIE. Imagine! I’m a love-struck youth again.”
The poem ends:
“Our names on the window begin to fade Slowly, slowly, They weep as they vanish.”
I am mindful of the words John Keats wanted engraved on his tombstone, as though to underscore the transience of life: “HERE LIES ONE WHOSE NAME WAS WRIT IN WATER”. In a recent lecture at Emory University, the Peruvian writer, Mario Vargas Llosa, characterised poetry as “the Princely Journal”. That strikes me as a wise and provocative description of this ancient art and its eloquent labour. It also sums up my thinking about Running Late, an intimate and valuable journal that fully merits the royal adjective.
John Stone [email protected]
In brief Book Are my meds me?
Is It Me or My Meds? Living with Antidepressants David A Karp. Harvard University Press, 2006. US$29·95. £16·95. Pp 304. ISBN 0-674-02182-7.
A Scanner Darkly Directed by Richard Linklater. Warner Independent Pictures, 2006. On general release in the USA and Europe.
834
“US citizens spent $12 billion on antidepressant medication in 2001”, David Karp tells us. In that case, it is definitely about time that we heard what people think about the drugs they are prescribed. Karp sets out to weave the opinions he has collected from people who use psychotropic medication into a fascinating, incisive, and comprehensive essay. Indeed, the debate on psychiatric medications extends far beyond side-effects and drug effectiveness; incorporating questions of identity, social acceptance, the dominance of the biomedical model of disease, and the role of the drug industry in medicalising normal feelings for profit. The more I read, the more I agreed with Karp; taking a pill, is not simply taking a pill. Karp explores the conflicting concerns facing those who are prescribed such treatment. Is It Me or My Meds? offers doctors an
insight into the difficult choices their patients face, but its greatest value may lie in showing those who take antidepressants that they are not alone. Understanding patients’ views on this issue is an important part of deciding whether the US public should be prescribed another $12 billion dollars of antidepressants next year.
Lindsay Banham [email protected]
Film Drugs and a dark future
Hints of a major conspiracy haunt the film, which is set in the near future. A recovery programme, NewPath, may be getting people hooked on a brain-destroying pill called Substance D. One of the drug’s many victims is Bob (Reeves), an ex-dealer who now works as an undercover cop and can’t remember who he is half the time. Like much of Dick’s fiction, A Scanner Darkly tags identity crises as a hallmark of modern existence. Illicit and licit drugs may promise a respite from ennui, but they turn users into the ultimate drones. Everyday people are no match for this dirty business and the cruel irony at its core: the organic component of Substance D is a lovely blue flower. Bob identifies it with his few remaining brain cells: “Death rising from the earth, from the ground itself.”
Keanu Reeves seems born to play one role: the average guy who slips dazed and confused into—as his character puts it in A Scanner Darkly—“the whole process hidden behind the surface of our reality”. In this adaptation of a tale by science-fiction writer Philip K Dick, the rabbit hole leads him to the shady network of state and corporate forces responsible for society’s Darrell Hartman dependence on escapist drugs. [email protected]
www.thelancet.com Vol 368 September 2, 2006
Book An intimate journal In the summer of 2001, I taught a course in literature and medicine to American college students at University College Oxford. I’ve taught this course on many occasions: “a survey of the unique world of medicine as reflected in literature”. For me, teaching in Oxford is a full 6 weeks of unbridled Anglophilia and bibliophilia, with Blackwell’s book shop just two blocks away. My agreeably small class of students and I read widely, from W H Auden to Samuel Beckett, William Carlos Williams to John Donne, John McCrae to the gnomic Emily Dickinson, William Osler to Anton Chekhov to Dannie Abse. None of the writers we’ve studied are alive today, with the exception of Dannie Abse. I’ve known him for many years and he invited me and my class to visit him in London. On our way to the Abse home, we stopped in Hampstead to see the Keats House and pay our respects. I thought of the frightful bright-red haemoptysis that Keats recognised as his “death warrant”; I imagined him pacing the lonely and contagious garden; or reading and writing, house-bound, as he fell hopelessly in love with Fanny Brawne; I even assisted Little John down the drive and saw him off, in my mind’s eye, to the carriage that would take him to the boat that would take him to Rome and to his death. Dannie and his wife, Joan, welcomed us warmly. Over tea and scones, we talked of medicine—some students would soon be in medical school. Dannie answered some questions about Keats, his life and poetry. Then a student, Danielle, asked Dannie if he would read a poem for us. Dannie smiled, saying, “Why don’t you read for us”, and handed her a copy of his poem, White Coat, Purple Coat. The poem concerns the two symbolic coats that physician-writers wear. Danielle did a fine job. Dannie then read a www.thelancet.com Vol 368 September 2, 2006
poem of his called Carnal Knowledge, the title of which belies its subject. It’s not about the sexual act, but about anatomical dissection, the common endeavour of medical students since Vesalius. The poem begins around 1944 during an attack on London by German V-rockets; at the time Dannie was studying medicine at King’s College. The poem records indelible
“Running Late is splendid, hard-earned poetry—and an important addition to Dannie Abse’s literary oeuvre.” elements of the dissection; depicts a memorable service of gratitude for those who gave their bodies to medical science; and ends with a line that echoes Keats: “with my hand, my living hand”. It was a powerful experience to hear Dannie read from his work, as it always is. Born in Cardiff, Wales, in 1923, Dannie Abse’s medical training was completed in 1950 at King’s College, London (his first book of poems came out in 1948). For many years, without skipping a beat—or an iamb—he managed to do both writing and medicine; then gradually he gave up the practice of medicine altogether in exchange for full-time writing. Running Late is his 15th book of poems. Decades ago, writer-friends began to tell me that I should meet Dannie Abse, because he and I were in the same business: both physicians, both writing poems. We finally met face-to-face on a Stone family vacation in England more than 30 years ago. Dannie and I immediately retreated to their lovely garden, talking poems. That first chat has become an enduring conversation, any loose ends sewn together when he was next in the USA or I in England. I was already prepared for sorrow when I received my review copy of
Running Late. And it was there, in the front of the book: “Running Late is dedicated to the memory of Joan Abse who was killed in a car crash on June 13, 2005.” Dannie and Joan had been married for more than 50 years. Running Late is informed throughout by the inevitable intersections of love and loss. Many of the poems, however, seem to have been written before Joan’s death and these tend to modulate the felt sorrow of the reader. Ovid’s Wish combines Dannie’s humour and fondness for classical allusions. The opening lines:
Running Late Dannie Abse. Hutchinson/ Random House, 2006. Pp 80. £9·99. ISBN 0-091-79697-0.
“I’d rather be in hell with one woman than in heaven with all those sexless angels Corinna may deceive me and then we quarrel—but oh what reconciliations!”
Later, Cupid makes an appearance: “Sleep’s a rehearsal for undying Death. There’s time enough for nights of peace. So shoot on, with one eye closed, mischievous boy: let your arrows seek my heart forever.”
Running Late is splendid, hardearned poetry—and an important addition to Dannie Abse’s literary oeuvre. The poet’s “voices”, lyrical, playful, elegant, musical, and heartbreaking, are all present. Postcard to his Wife shows a deft touch, despite the underlying sorrow: “Wish you were here. It’s a calm summer’s day and the dulcamara of memory is not enough. I confess without you I know the impoverishment of self and the Venus de Milo is only stone. So come home. The bed’s too big! Make excuses…”
There are literary precedents for writing to a lost loved one. The actress, Olga Knipper, Anton Chekhov’s wife, continued to write letters to him for a full 2 months after he died. A Marriage, the title poem of Running Late, dates from 2004. The
To find out more about Dannie Abse and to hear him reading one of his own poems, In The Theatre, see The Poetry Archive website http://www. poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/ singlePoem.do?poemId=72.
833
Perspectives
poem recalls the early courtship days of the poet and the woman who was to become his wife. After their secretive liaisons (the landlady’s law was NO VISITORS AFTER 10 PM), he would make “a burglar’s exit”, past the landlady’s dog and “its virtuoso chilling bark:” “I hear its echo still at the front garden gate, down the lamplit street, faint, through the hurrying years to where we are, in sickness and in health, in perdurable love, ageing together, lagging somewhat, slowly running late.”
Dannie Abse has always had a sure sense of how to “close” or end a poem, which is a crucial part of making poems. As you can see, he
most assuredly still has the touch. This is a stunning close to a stunning poem. Dannie Abse’s writing has been prescient, as poetry may sometimes be, especially in his love poems, of which there are many fine examples. A poem of his written 20 years ago makes the point. Condensation on a Windowpane is instantly recognisable as a love poem. The following lines are from that poem, just as the poet writes on the water condensed on the window pane: “My finger squeaks on glass. I write JOAN. I write DANNIE. Imagine! I’m a love-struck youth again.”
The poem ends:
“Our names on the window begin to fade Slowly, slowly, They weep as they vanish.”
I am mindful of the words John Keats wanted engraved on his tombstone, as though to underscore the transience of life: “HERE LIES ONE WHOSE NAME WAS WRIT IN WATER”. In a recent lecture at Emory University, the Peruvian writer, Mario Vargas Llosa, characterised poetry as “the Princely Journal”. That strikes me as a wise and provocative description of this ancient art and its eloquent labour. It also sums up my thinking about Running Late, an intimate and valuable journal that fully merits the royal adjective.
John Stone [email protected]
In brief Book Are my meds me?
Is It Me or My Meds? Living with Antidepressants David A Karp. Harvard University Press, 2006. US$29·95. £16·95. Pp 304. ISBN 0-674-02182-7.
A Scanner Darkly Directed by Richard Linklater. Warner Independent Pictures, 2006. On general release in the USA and Europe.
834
“US citizens spent $12 billion on antidepressant medication in 2001”, David Karp tells us. In that case, it is definitely about time that we heard what people think about the drugs they are prescribed. Karp sets out to weave the opinions he has collected from people who use psychotropic medication into a fascinating, incisive, and comprehensive essay. Indeed, the debate on psychiatric medications extends far beyond side-effects and drug effectiveness; incorporating questions of identity, social acceptance, the dominance of the biomedical model of disease, and the role of the drug industry in medicalising normal feelings for profit. The more I read, the more I agreed with Karp; taking a pill, is not simply taking a pill. Karp explores the conflicting concerns facing those who are prescribed such treatment. Is It Me or My Meds? offers doctors an
insight into the difficult choices their patients face, but its greatest value may lie in showing those who take antidepressants that they are not alone. Understanding patients’ views on this issue is an important part of deciding whether the US public should be prescribed another $12 billion dollars of antidepressants next year.
Lindsay Banham [email protected]
Film Drugs and a dark future
Hints of a major conspiracy haunt the film, which is set in the near future. A recovery programme, NewPath, may be getting people hooked on a brain-destroying pill called Substance D. One of the drug’s many victims is Bob (Reeves), an ex-dealer who now works as an undercover cop and can’t remember who he is half the time. Like much of Dick’s fiction, A Scanner Darkly tags identity crises as a hallmark of modern existence. Illicit and licit drugs may promise a respite from ennui, but they turn users into the ultimate drones. Everyday people are no match for this dirty business and the cruel irony at its core: the organic component of Substance D is a lovely blue flower. Bob identifies it with his few remaining brain cells: “Death rising from the earth, from the ground itself.”
Keanu Reeves seems born to play one role: the average guy who slips dazed and confused into—as his character puts it in A Scanner Darkly—“the whole process hidden behind the surface of our reality”. In this adaptation of a tale by science-fiction writer Philip K Dick, the rabbit hole leads him to the shady network of state and corporate forces responsible for society’s Darrell Hartman dependence on escapist drugs. [email protected]
www.thelancet.com Vol 368 September 2, 2006