Being Ill: Idioms, Registers and Styles

Contributions by Krystyna Koziołek Contributions by Hanna Serkowska Contributions by Grzegorz Olszański Contributions by Agnieszka Gajewska Contributions by Jakub Orzeszek Contributions by Beata Koper Contributions by Maciej Duda Contributions by Anna Wojciechowska-Ruppert Edited by Monika Ładoń Edited by Ireneusz Gielata

Book cover: Being Ill: Idioms, Registers and Styles

Extent: 196 pages

Publisher: V&R unipress

Subjects: Medicine

Language: English

Hardback (Published)

(January 2026)

ISBN: 9783847119364

6.3 x 9.33 inches

Price: $63.00

In stock

This volume adopts a multi-layered, interdisciplinary approach to the cultural representations of being ill. The contributors study idioms and styles used to describe illness in literature and film.


This volume is a collection of studies on the experience of being ill as represented in a diverse range of literary and film works, offered by Polish scholars with an interest in the combination of medical, cultural and social contexts (disease, illness, sickness). The focus is on narrative strategies that condition the idiomatic styles of writing (about) disease. The analyses also cover extra-individual codes for expressing the experience of illness, arising from cultural orders or literary genres. The contributors examine cultural representations of, i.a., melancholy, depression, Parkinson’s disease and other boundary situations (e.g., mourning or COVID pandemics). With its diversity of study approaches, the book inscribes itself in the widely defined Polish maladic discourse criticism.

  • Contributions by Krystyna Koziołek
  • Contributions by Hanna Serkowska
  • Contributions by Grzegorz Olszański
  • Contributions by Agnieszka Gajewska
  • Contributions by Jakub Orzeszek
  • Contributions by Beata Koper
  • Contributions by Maciej Duda
  • Contributions by Anna Wojciechowska-Ruppert
  • Edited by Monika Ładoń
  • Edited by Ireneusz Gielata