Matters of Life and Death

Abstract

Medicine has provided much inspiration to writers within the Western theatrical tradition, but the representation of physicians, patients, and medical practices has significantly changed in the last decades. Distancing themselves from heroic narratives of progress and inventiveness common in the first half of the twentieth century, contemporary writers for the stage have instead focused on problematic aspects of the relationship between physicians and their patients. The target of these critical perspectives is the “medical gaze”, the objectification of patients that results from addressing illness as a mere scientific problem requiring a quick solution, thus downplaying the patient’s personal experience of suffering (Shephard-Barr, 2006; Garner, 2020). In this article, I discuss the methodologies that guided the writing of my theatre play 'All Too Human' ('Demasiado Humano'), which reflects on the ethical questions associated with the development of new medical treatments. These methodologies were inspired by my work as a historian of science.