The Poetics and Politics of Alzheimers Disease Life-Writing [Paperback]

This is the first book-length exploration of the thoughts and experiences expressed by dementia patients in published narratives over the last thirty years. It contrasts third-person caregiver and first-person patient accounts from different languages and a range of media, focusing on the poetical and political questions these narratives raise: what images do narrators appropriate; what narrative plot do they adapt; and how do they draw on established strategies of life-writing. It also analyses how these accounts engage with the culturally dominant Alzheimers narrative that centres on dependence and vulnerability, and addresses how they relate to discourses of gender and aging. Linking literary scholarship to the medico-scientific understanding of dementia as a neurodegenerative condition, this book argues that, first, patients articulations must be made central to dementia discourse; and second, committed alleviation of caregiver burden through social support systems and altered healthcare policies requires significantly altered views about aging, dementia, and Alzheimers patients.

Introduction: Critically Reading Dementia Narratives: Amplifying Advocacy.- Chapter 1: Of Wives and Daughters: The Stereotype of Caring Females?.- Chapter 2: From a Care-Free Distance: Sons Talking About Cultural Concepts.- Chapter 3: About Tradition and Triumph: Patients Popularise Dementia Narrative.- Chapter 4: On Reclaiming Authority: The Enabling Discourse of Alzheimers Disease.- Conclusion: Dementia Narratives  Shifter of Perspectives and Values.- Bibliography.-  Works Cited.- Index.