Upojona chorobą. W trzewiach świata… Eve Ensler
Intoxicated by illness. In the Body of the World… by Eve Ensler

Author(s): Monika Ładoń
Subject(s): Philology
Published by: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego
Keywords: Eve Ensler; cancer; metaphor; Susan Sontag
Summary/Abstract: Eve Ensler is an American writer, the authoress of famous The Vagina Monologues, a feminist, the founder of a global activist movement to end violence against women and girls (V-Day). This article is devoted to interpretation of a memoir book by Ensler written after the cancer experience. Ensler writes simultaneously about physiological and philosophical side of cancer. She doesn’t avoid naturalistic descriptions of her own body, but she appreciates her condition. Ensler writes her patography as a person “intoxicated by illness”, according to Anatole Broyard’s words. The meaning of a cancer disease is formed on several levels. For example, the metaphor is most important for language. Ensler uses (or abuses) metaphors against warnings by Susan Sontag. The authoress is also trying to connect her own disease with the suffering of the world. Thus, the book turns into a political and social manifesto.

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