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We end the podcast after thirty episodes over three years. In this brief, last episode, we announce the end of this series, explain our reasons for ending it now, summarize what we covered over the thirty episodes, and express our appreciation for our listeners and the guests who came on the podcast. We also reveal what is next for us, which will involve similar interests but we will expand our sources beyond humanities in a narrow sense to encompass broader ideas relevant to health and biomedicine, such as philosophy, ethics, sociology, history, and religion, among others. While we will continue to produce audio programming, we will also produce written works such as essays, reviews, critiques, and reflections. Most of this work will be available through MedHum.org.

MedHum.org is an independent, online, multidisciplinary, and multimedia collaborative for identifying and generating critical thinking in health, culture, and the arts. It began in early 2024 following the discontinuation of the NYU Literature, Art and Medicine Database (LitMed), which had been a respected and consulted source around the world for perspectives on health and biomedicine drawn from the humanities. MedHum.org builds on the LitMed model and expands on the content sources and media used for its work. Look for us there, and subscribe to the MedHum.org newsletter for announcements of new contributions.

Links

• The Clinic & The Person website listing all episodes
• Russell Teagarden’s blog post with summary of each podcast episode
• MedHum.org site
• MedHum.org newsletter

Please send us comments, recommendations, and questions to this text link, or email to russell.teagarden@gmail.com

Thanks to all the listeners and to all our guests.

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Note: The story and the images in the book we cover in this episode could bring back memories of unhappy and traumatic events for some people who have experienced cancer in some way.

This episode centers on the fictional story of a forty-three-year-old woman’s course with recurrent, metastatic breast cancer. She has a coming-of-age-daughter and a treasured husband. The story is a common one in literature and in real life, but the way it’s told in Maddie Mortimer’s novel, Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies, is not common in that a lot of the narration—variously in first-, second-, and third-person forms—comes from the cancer itself, as that can be inferred. Nor is it common in Mortimer’s use of a variety of written and graphic forms. While these and many other aspects of the novel are worthy of attention, our interest was limited to what the cancer narration offers to the story and the understanding of cancer from the pathological to the personal.

Mortimer’s writing style and the literary forms she used made it possible for us to differentiate scenes and scenarios we described as clever, affecting, compelling, gorgeous, or beautiful from events and realizations we described as awful, obscene, terrible, scary, or hard. We worked to reconcile these antipodes as necessary for the complete and poignant portrayal of the course this cancer took and the effects it had on the characters. The distinction also assisted us in considering whether or not all or just parts of the book could be interesting and useful to various constituencies (e.g., patients, family, students, support groups, etc). While doing so, we often expressed astonishment that Mortimer, who was in her mid-twenties when she wrote the novel, and has no formal training in medicine, could possess such sophisticated and technical insights into the molecular biology, pathology, and pharmacology of cancer, and in the emotional torments and practical realities accompanying it.

We were joined by Dr. Laurel Lyckholm from West Virginia University Cancer Institute, who started her medical career as a registered nurse and later became a physician board certified in medicine, medical oncology, hematology, and hospice and palliative medicine. She has formal training and experience in medical ethics and medical humanities, and has a particular interest in support programming for adolescents and young adults with cancer and their families. Her work and dedication have won her many awards for teaching, leadership, and patient care. We were fortunate to have her with us and we thank her profusely for her valuable time and thoughtful perspectives.

Links

• Publisher (Simon & Shuster) website for Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies
• Video interview with Maddie Mortimer in which she describes how she created the novel.
• Russell Teagarden’s blog piece on doxorubicin infusion effects as the cancer describes them.

Audio source

Audio clips were from Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies audiobook available on Spotify.

Please send us comments, recommendations, and questions to this text link, or email to: russell.teagarden@theclinicandtheperson.com.

Thanks for listening, and please follow The Clinic & The Person wherever you get your podcasts, or visit our website.

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Michael Pollan, a journalist long known for his work in food and nutrition, and as the author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma, shifted his attention to psychedelics when they were beginning to win favor again after having been shunned—legally and culturally—for three decades. Pollan’s interest took the form of “immersive journalism,” meaning he tried some of the psychedelics himself, and directed his investigation into “the potential for these molecules as a tool for both understanding the mind and, potentially, changing it.” The result was his 2018 book, How to Change Your Mind, and a companion documentary film. Taking our lead from his book, we focus on: consciousness, spirituality, and mysticism as what is at work in the effects psychedelics produce, and how they may delineate limits to biomedicine (rational or not), that is, how they brighten or blur the line between classic biomedicine and whatever isn’t.

Links

• Michael Pollan's website
• Trailer for Netflix documentary film based on How to Change Your Mind
• The UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics cofounded by Michael Pollan
• Russell Teagarden’s blog pieces on his book, How to Change Your Mind, and on his book, This is Your Mind on Plants
• Video of Timothy Leary at Golden Gate Park Human Be – In (Jan 14, 1967

Our next episode will feature Maddie Mortimer’s novel, Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies. We are interested in this common, but tragic story of a mother and wife with terminal cancer and a daughter coming of age, told in an uncommon way with cancer cells serving as narrators at times and the use of graphics, poetry, and other forms of storytelling. Joining us will be Dr. Laurel Lykholm, who is a medical oncologist and who also works in medical ethics and medical humanities.

Please send us comments, recommendations, and questions to this text link, or email to: russell.teagarden@theclinicandtheperson.com.

Thanks for listening, and please follow The Clinic & The Person wherever you get your podcasts, or visit our website.