On Being Ill

1st edition cover, designed by Vanessa Bell

On Being Ill is an essay by Virginia Woolf that appeared in T. S. Eliot's The Criterion in January, 1926; The essay was later reprinted, with revisions, in Forum in April 1926, under the title Illness: An Unexploited Mine.

The essay seeks to establish illness as a serious subject of literature along the lines of love, jealousy and battle. Woolf writes, "Considering how common illness is, how tremendous the spiritual change that it brings, how astonishing, when the lights of health go down, the undiscovered countries that are then disclosed, what wastes and deserts of the soul a slight attack of influenza brings to light...it becomes strange indeed that illness has not taken its place with love, battle, and jealousy among the prime themes of literature. Novels, one would have thought, would have been devoted to influenza; epic poems to typhoid; odes to pneumonia, lyrics to toothache. But no; ... literature does its best to maintain that its concern is with the mind; that the body is a sheet of plain glass through which the soul looks straight and clear."

This article about an essay or essay collection is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.v · Categories: Books by Virginia Woolf Essays 1926 works Works originally published in The Criterion (magazine) Essay stubs Wikimedia Foundation. 2010. Игры ⚽ Поможем сделать НИР Numerical data Chongzuo Look at other dictionaries: being sad — being filled with sadness, being ill tempered, being gloomy, being full of sorrow, feeling sorry for something; getting a shape, crystallization …   English contemporary dictionary ill — 01. Howard s wife has been [ill] recently, so I don t think they ll be able to come to the party. 02. The accused murderer is believed to be mentally [ill]. 03. Parrots that are kept in cages often become mentally [ill] from boredom. 04. My… …   Grammatical examples in English ill health — N UNCOUNT Someone who suffers from ill health has an illness or keeps being ill. He was forced to retire because of ill health... As a child she had suffered regular bouts of ill health …   English dictionary ill-naturedness — noun The state of being ill natured …   Wiktionary Ill Niño — in 2010 Background information Origin New Jersey, US Genres …   Wikipedia Ill — ([i^]l), a. [The regular comparative and superlative are wanting, their places being supplied by worseand worst, from another root.] [OE. ill, ille, Icel. illr; akin to Sw. illa, adv., Dan. ilde, adv.] 1. Contrary to good, in a physical sense;… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English Ill at ease — Ill Ill ([i^]l), a. [The regular comparative and superlative are wanting, their places being supplied by worseand worst, from another root.] [OE. ill, ille, Icel. illr; akin to Sw. illa, adv., Dan. ilde, adv.] 1. Contrary to good, in a physical… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English Ill blood — Ill Ill ([i^]l), a. [The regular comparative and superlative are wanting, their places being supplied by worseand worst, from another root.] [OE. ill, ille, Icel. illr; akin to Sw. illa, adv., Dan. ilde, adv.] 1. Contrary to good, in a physical… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English Ill breeding — Ill Ill ([i^]l), a. [The regular comparative and superlative are wanting, their places being supplied by worseand worst, from another root.] [OE. ill, ille, Icel. illr; akin to Sw. illa, adv., Dan. ilde, adv.] 1. Contrary to good, in a physical… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English Ill fame — Ill Ill ([i^]l), a. [The regular comparative and superlative are wanting, their places being supplied by worseand worst, from another root.] [OE. ill, ille, Icel. illr; akin to Sw. illa, adv., Dan. ilde, adv.] 1. Contrary to good, in a physical… …   The Collaborative International Dictionary of English 18+ © Academic, 2000-2024 Contact us: Technical Support, Advertising Dictionaries export, created on PHP, Joomla, Drupal, WordPress, MODx. Mark and share Search through all dictionaries Translate… Search Internet Share the article and excerpts Direct link … Do a right-click on the link above and select “Copy Link”