The Illness Lesson is a novel about a 19th-century educational experiment in which several girls gather in a former utopian community to attend a new school for women and men. However, education does not exempt girls from their future responsibilities, and bored teenagers soon manifest their simmering feminist anger in the form of tics, seizures, rashes, walking barefoot in the snow, and self-injury. This masterfully written piece is exciting and multi-faceted.
In this exciting historical piece, teenage girls undergo outrageous treatment by paternalistic doctors in New England schools in the 1970s. The Illness Lesson explores the crushing weight of oppression and the relentless power of female defiance. The main themes of the novel are feminism, women’s rights to their bodies, as well as the mind-body connection.
The novel captivates the reader from the first page. There is a lyrical and poetic tone, a setting of the 19th century, and red birds that have their symbolism in the book. Clare Beams is a great storyteller. She completely allows the reader to sort things out and link all the events. In addition, Beams uses a lot of artistic elements and techniques. This book is suitable for connoisseurs of fiction and feminist themes.
