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Living in the Land of Limbo: Fiction and Poetry about Family Caregiving
AAUP Books Committee "Outstanding" Title of 2015
Living in the Land of Limbo is the first anthology of short stories and poems about family caregivers. These men and women find themselves in "limbo," as they struggle to take care of a family member or friend in the uncertain world of chronic illness. The authors explore caregivers' experiences as they deal with family conflicts, the complexities of the health care system, and the impact of their choices on their lives and the lives of others. The book includes selections devoted to caregivers of aging parents; husbands and wives; ill children; and relatives, lovers, and friends. A final section is devoted to paid caregivers and their clients. Among the conditions that form the background of the selections are dementia, HIV/AIDS, mental illness, multiple sclerosis, and pediatric cancer.
Many of the authors are well-known poets and writers, but others have not been published in mainstream media. They represent a range of cultural backgrounds. Although their works approach caregiving in very different ways, the authors share a commitment to emotional truth, unvarnished by societal ideals of what caregivers should feel and do. These stories and poems paint profoundly moving and revealing portraits of family caregivers.
Living in the Land of Limbo is the first anthology of short stories and poems about family caregivers. These men and women find themselves in "limbo," as they struggle to take care of a family member or friend in the uncertain world of chronic illness. The authors explore caregivers' experiences as they deal with family conflicts, the complexities of the health care system, and the impact of their choices on their lives and the lives of others. The book includes selections devoted to caregivers of aging parents; husbands and wives; ill children; and relatives, lovers, and friends. A final section is devoted to paid caregivers and their clients. Among the conditions that form the background of the selections are dementia, HIV/AIDS, mental illness, multiple sclerosis, and pediatric cancer.
Many of the authors are well-known poets and writers, but others have not been published in mainstream media. They represent a range of cultural backgrounds. Although their works approach caregiving in very different ways, the authors share a commitment to emotional truth, unvarnished by societal ideals of what caregivers should feel and do. These stories and poems paint profoundly moving and revealing portraits of family caregivers.
296 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2014
About the author
Carol Levine
31 books6 followersCarol Levine has taken the “road less traveled” on her career path. As an undergraduate at Cornell University, she studied Russian history, literature (with Vladimir Nabokov), and language. She continued her studies at Columbia University as a Ford Foundation Fellow and received an MA in public law and government. The link to her current position as director of the United Hospital Fund’s Families and Health Care Project is not immediately apparent, but each step along the way honed her skills as a researcher, analyst, and writer.
She was introduced to the world of medical ethics through her 12-year tenure at The Hastings Center, where she edited the Hastings Center Report and is now a Hastings Center Fellow. Much of her work in the 1980s and early 1990s concerned HIV/AIDS and ethics, and in 1993 she was awarded a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship for that work.
She joined the United Hospital Fund in 1996 to work on issues related to family caregiving, a professional interest that grew out of her personal experience as a caregiver to her late husband who was disabled as the result of an automobile accident. That work has been recognized by her designation as a WebMD Health Hero in 2007 and a Civic Ventures Purpose Prize Fellow in 2009. She serves on many advisory boards related to aging, family caregiving, and long-term care. She contributes to the United Hospital Fund's Facebook page Family Caregivers and Better Health Care.
In addition to publishing many professional and consumer articles, she edited Always On Call: When Illness Turns Families into Caregivers (2nd ed., Vanderbilt University Press, 2004), and with Thomas H. Murray, co-edited The Cultures of Caregiving: Conflict and Common Ground among Families, Health Professionals and Policy Maker (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004).
While working on Planning for Long-Term Care for Dummies (Wiley, 2014), she was also compiling an anthology, Living in the Land of Limbo: Fiction and Poetry about Family Caregiving (Vanderbilt University Press, 2014). This brings her abiding interest in literature full circle.
Carol lives in New York City, surrounded by books and needlepoint and, as often as possible, by children and grandchildren.
She was introduced to the world of medical ethics through her 12-year tenure at The Hastings Center, where she edited the Hastings Center Report and is now a Hastings Center Fellow. Much of her work in the 1980s and early 1990s concerned HIV/AIDS and ethics, and in 1993 she was awarded a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship for that work.
She joined the United Hospital Fund in 1996 to work on issues related to family caregiving, a professional interest that grew out of her personal experience as a caregiver to her late husband who was disabled as the result of an automobile accident. That work has been recognized by her designation as a WebMD Health Hero in 2007 and a Civic Ventures Purpose Prize Fellow in 2009. She serves on many advisory boards related to aging, family caregiving, and long-term care. She contributes to the United Hospital Fund's Facebook page Family Caregivers and Better Health Care.
In addition to publishing many professional and consumer articles, she edited Always On Call: When Illness Turns Families into Caregivers (2nd ed., Vanderbilt University Press, 2004), and with Thomas H. Murray, co-edited The Cultures of Caregiving: Conflict and Common Ground among Families, Health Professionals and Policy Maker (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004).
While working on Planning for Long-Term Care for Dummies (Wiley, 2014), she was also compiling an anthology, Living in the Land of Limbo: Fiction and Poetry about Family Caregiving (Vanderbilt University Press, 2014). This brings her abiding interest in literature full circle.
Carol lives in New York City, surrounded by books and needlepoint and, as often as possible, by children and grandchildren.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 12, 2014
What happens to the ones we cherish that still remain, but look upon us as if we are strangers? Carol Levine, who compiled and edited “Living in the Land of Limbo: Fiction and Poetry about Family Caregiving,” brings readers a collection that seeks to answer that question.
In her introduction, Levine writes: “If birth and death are universal, the experience of caring for someone with a chronic or terminal illness is nearly so. Despite a pervasive myth of family abandonment, most people are accompanied and cared for through illness or disability by relatives, friends, and others close to them. These caregivers — ‘family’ understood broadly — live in the land of limbo.”
In the stories and poems that follow, readers are given voices of the in-betweeners — characters who, in attempting to care for a loved one who is ill, must journey to a place where life may only exist as long as the memory can be sustained. We follow each and every caretaker through their similar, yet individual difficulties as they aid their parent, lover, child, or friend. For whatever reason it may be, each character works through accepting the reality of life as it transcends into the unknown.
“Living in the Land of Limbo” is a provoking and delicate contemporary collection that showcases a variety of short fiction and poetry from some of the best writers, including but not limited to Raymond Carver, Alice Munro, Donald Hall, Allegra Goodman, and Ha Jin. Much of the work focuses on caring for those who are physically or mentally incapacitated. While there are over 20 writers in the collection, the pieces are connected by themes of life and the in-between.
The anthology is separated by five sections — Part I: “Children of Aging Parents,” Part II: “Husbands and Wives,” Part III: “Parents and Sick Children,” Part IV: “Relatives, Lovers, and Friends,” and lastly, Part V: “Paid Caregivers.” The first section begins with choice writer Julie Otsuka, who astonishes with her short story “Diem Perdidi” about a daughter caring for her aging mother who suffers from Alzheimer’s.
In the selection, Otsuka writes: “She does not remember how she got the bruises on her arms or going for a walk with you earlier this morning. She does not remember bending over, during that walk, and plucking a flower from a neighbor’s front yard and slipping it into her hair. Maybe your father will kiss me now. She does not remember what she ate for dinner last night, or when she last took her medicine. She does not remember to drink enough water. She does not remember to comb her hair.”
Readers grow close with every character in this collection as they experience frustration, humor, setbacks, improvements, sorrow, love, and even loss. However, we complete the book learning perhaps the most important lesson of all. Life is full of good and bad memories — but we must make the choice as to which will lead us out of the “land of limbo” and into the land of the living.
In her introduction, Levine writes: “If birth and death are universal, the experience of caring for someone with a chronic or terminal illness is nearly so. Despite a pervasive myth of family abandonment, most people are accompanied and cared for through illness or disability by relatives, friends, and others close to them. These caregivers — ‘family’ understood broadly — live in the land of limbo.”
In the stories and poems that follow, readers are given voices of the in-betweeners — characters who, in attempting to care for a loved one who is ill, must journey to a place where life may only exist as long as the memory can be sustained. We follow each and every caretaker through their similar, yet individual difficulties as they aid their parent, lover, child, or friend. For whatever reason it may be, each character works through accepting the reality of life as it transcends into the unknown.
“Living in the Land of Limbo” is a provoking and delicate contemporary collection that showcases a variety of short fiction and poetry from some of the best writers, including but not limited to Raymond Carver, Alice Munro, Donald Hall, Allegra Goodman, and Ha Jin. Much of the work focuses on caring for those who are physically or mentally incapacitated. While there are over 20 writers in the collection, the pieces are connected by themes of life and the in-between.
The anthology is separated by five sections — Part I: “Children of Aging Parents,” Part II: “Husbands and Wives,” Part III: “Parents and Sick Children,” Part IV: “Relatives, Lovers, and Friends,” and lastly, Part V: “Paid Caregivers.” The first section begins with choice writer Julie Otsuka, who astonishes with her short story “Diem Perdidi” about a daughter caring for her aging mother who suffers from Alzheimer’s.
In the selection, Otsuka writes: “She does not remember how she got the bruises on her arms or going for a walk with you earlier this morning. She does not remember bending over, during that walk, and plucking a flower from a neighbor’s front yard and slipping it into her hair. Maybe your father will kiss me now. She does not remember what she ate for dinner last night, or when she last took her medicine. She does not remember to drink enough water. She does not remember to comb her hair.”
Readers grow close with every character in this collection as they experience frustration, humor, setbacks, improvements, sorrow, love, and even loss. However, we complete the book learning perhaps the most important lesson of all. Life is full of good and bad memories — but we must make the choice as to which will lead us out of the “land of limbo” and into the land of the living.
April 3, 2015
Oh my gosh! This anthology was an unexpected song! It was like getting lots of hugs from dear friends you hadn't seen in years. It gave me so much hope, laughter... and then some tears... maybe more. These stories were a hand guiding me in the pitch black darkness. I can't tell you how much I enjoyed these stories.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews