Ιστορίες ενός γιατρού ανθολογημένες από τον Robert Coles

by William Carlos Williams, Robert Coles (editor), Γιάννης Ζέρβας (Translator)

Ο Γουίλιαμς έχει μεταφραστεί ως τώρα ελάχιστα στα ελληνικά και πολλοί στην Ελλάδα τον αγνοούσαν μέχρι την εντυπωσιακή ταινία Πάτερσον του Τζιμ Τζάρμους. Στις Ιστορίες ενός Γιατρού καταφέρνει κάτι μοναδικό. Ξεδιπλώνει -με μεγάλη συγγραφική μαεστρία- την ταυτόχρονη ευαισθησία και σκληρότητα της ιατρικής, πλάι στις φτωχές εργατικές κοινότητες της Αμερικής, και μας αποκαλύπτει την εικόνα μιας πλευράς της χώρας του αποκλεισμένης από το αμερικανικό όνειρο.

Το βιβλίο αυτό, πέρα από υψηλή λογοτεχνία, είναι μια μαρτυρία γραμμένη από έναν γιατρό που νοιαζόταν για τους ανθρώπους και που ήξερε να διακρίνει όλες τις αποχρώσεις της ανθρωπιάς, των αντοχών και των ορίων τους στον εαυτό του και στους άλλους. Χωρίς διακρίσεις. Χωρίς υποκρισίες. Είναι μι περιγραφή της άσκησης της ιατρικής που δεν χάνει ίχνος από την ιατρική της ακρίβεια και τη θεραπευτική της δύναμη. Η αξία όμως πολλαπλασιάζεται λόγω της κοινωνικής και ψυχολογικής ευαισθησίας αλλά και τη διεισδυτική ματιά ενός σπουδαίου ποιητή.

Genres: Medicine, Short Stories, Fiction, Poetry, Medical, Literature, Classics

252 pages, Paperback

First published September 28, 1984

About the author

William Carlos Williams was an American poet closely associated with modernism and Imagism. He was also a pediatrician and general practitioner of medicine. Williams "worked harder at being a writer than he did at being a physician," wrote biographer Linda Wagner-Martin. During his long lifetime, Williams excelled both as a poet and a physician.

Although his primary occupation was as a doctor, Williams had a full literary career. His work consists of short stories, poems, plays, novels, critical essays, an autobiography, translations, and correspondence. He wrote at night and spent weekends in New York City with friends—writers and artists like the avant-garde painters Marcel Duchamp and Francis Picabia and the poets Wallace Stevens and Marianne Moore. He became involved in the Imagist movement but soon he began to develop opinions that differed from those of his poetic peers, Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot. Later in his life, Williams toured the United States giving poetry readings and lectures.

In May 1963, he was posthumously awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Pictures from Brueghel and Other Poems (1962) and the Gold Medal for Poetry of the National Institute of Arts and Letters. The Poetry Society of America continues to honor William Carlos Williams by presenting an annual award in his name for the best book of poetry published by a small, non-profit or university press.

Williams' house in Rutherford is now on the National Register of Historic Places. He was inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame in 2009.

Reviews

[brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is Just to Say

I have taken
the book
that was on
the bookshelf

and which
you were probably
saving
for later.

Forgive me
it was delicious
so tragic
and so human.

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 5 out of 5]

William Carlos Williams was perhaps (Gilbert) Sorrentino’s most abiding influence, which isn’t so surprising when reading these stories drawn from Williams’s life as a GP (which he practised his whole life, in addition to writing a bibliography this size—holymolywow). The stories are mildly experimental in their shunning of inverted commas and confusing first-person narrators with characters and reported speech, and their ear for dialect and speech is sharp—all things Sorrentino expanded upon in his Brooklyn novels. Otherwise, the content of these pieces is straightforward. Unlike the treacherous hells experienced by Bulgakov in his Country Doctor's Notebook (travelling through Russian blizzards to deliver babies using faulty forceps), Williams has lesser but equally teeth-clenching ills to compete with such as hysterical mothers, obstinate children and poor families with nine kids unable to spot him a few dollars for his trouble. All in a day’s work as neighbourhood saviour and poet shamelessly mining material. The straightforward tone of the stories, unflinching and honest, helps them deliver powerful suckerpunches to the heart. Contains several grimly wondrous poems too.

[notgettingenough · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having read A Fortunate Man recently, John Berger's account of the world view of a country doctor, I was pleased to discover in a Leiden bookshop the other day, this collection assembled by Williams' son.

Thirty years earlier, country US, written by a poet who supports himself through doctoring. Whereas it is Berger's eye which informs what we read about his country doctor, here it is the medico's eye that informs the writing. Having just been rereleased, there may be a new audience for this slim volume. It's enthralling to read as a lay person interested in fiction, but Williams' musings on the world of the general practitioner is not part of the canon for that group the way Berger's still is. Maybe, even compared with Berger's, it's too bluntly honest. Doctors don't come out of this smelling of any sort of flowers.

Having said that, if you are interested in medical views of literature that strays into their area, you can go here and here.

Highly recommended.

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Delightful little nuggets

[Jacob · Rating 1 out of 5]

Only read it because it was required for a medicine/literature elective. I didn't like the writing style (half the time I couldn't figure out who was speaking, so I read it over again, still couldn't, so I read it over again, then maybe could. And I am not stupid...) and the stories are pretty negative at times. Not very uplifting portrayal of medicine. I have no doubt the stories are true and quite honest both in their content as well as their emotion, but why would I want to read about the drudgery and negative aspects of a profession with only a few sprinklings of hope, celebration of man, and triumph/achievement. Not my kind of reading.

[Lindsay · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thankfully found The Doctor Stories rummaging through my beloved circuit of St. Louis used bookstores--up until this, I have only read WCW's poetry (which I love). Who knows how long I would have gone without reading his prose had this morsel not insisted in staying in my grasp?

...
I am failing to write what I need to say.
...
...
hmph
...


This is beautiful. This is humanity. Of course, this is what WCW is. It's been several years since I've really immersed myself in his poetry, but I need to go back and do it again. I knew all about him when I got into him years ago--his bio and poetry are fairly inseparable--but maybe it has taken this time to feel like I have a better handle of who he was as a person and how he faced the world. For the first time--really--it blew my mind to truly realize the depth of the life he led. How in the hell did he become so prolific as a writer working simultaneously as a pediatrician and obstetrician for decades? And had a family (though notoriously was put on the back burner), kept up with all of his great artistic friends, and still had time for womanizing? HA! How? What? Huh?

This collection dwells in a time when doctors made house calls; when births and deaths happened in the same bed, in the same neighborhood, in its own distinct language; before health insurance became the predominant factor for how you would be cared. WCW did not have a cush practice; he set his life to help those in poverty. His determination and undying passion for his work and people comes through equally strong in his stories as it does in his poetry. In this collection, you witness the destruction of cultural and ethnic barriers and feel the devotion of a man who has willed his life to the service of others.

I think the clincher for me, though, was the "The Practice" from his autobiography, wherein he relates the uniqueness of a physician's role in a person's (and community's) life and how poetry cannot help but flow from it. It brought me to my knees (and I've just added it to my faithful paperbackswap queue). In a way, it reminded me a lot of the role and importance of the public education system today. Sadly, doctors do not inhabit the same community role as they did 100 years ago. The opportunity Williams' speaks of to be involved with such a wide variety of people at various stages of their lives, to go far beyond the tasks his title deems he perform--boy, did that remind me of teaching. I'm about a breath away from embarking on a tirade, so I am stopping there.

This is beautiful. Please make sure to read his prose, too.

[Dana Clinton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review: The Doctor Stories (William Carlos Williams) I knew that William Carlos Williams was a well-known poet, but I didn't know that he was concurrently a very dedicated medical doctor in the poorest part of Paterson, New Jersey. His heart was in his writing, especially poetry, and yet to earn a living, he pursued this medical path. Through his experiences with under served patients with widely different backgrounds, often underpaid or not paid at all, he felt glimpses of the human reality that would inform his work. There is a great forward by Robert Coles and a sweet afterword by his son, and a selection of stories/poems/autobiographical comments which show care as well as frustration towards the humanity he encounters. Had he been just a literary figure, surely his body of writings would have been completely different, but had he been just a physician to the poor, his soul would have withered. As a doctor, he was "kind and understanding underneath, but bluntly practical and unsentimental". "If I did not have
verse
I would have died
or been
a thief

[Brad · Rating 2 out of 5]

I can respect that William Carlos Williams is one of the oldest and most famous physician writers. That being said, I don't much care for his writing style, particularly in his short stories. I had a hard time following who was speaking, what was simply thought versus said out loud, etc. And often the narrator doc was a jerk. I think that if someone wants to read interesting stories from the medical profession, medical blogs are the way to go. StorytellERdoc in particular is excellent, and I have links to other good medical blogs for anyone who is interested.

Williams' poems were good, though, and were responsible for moving my rating from 1 star to 2.

Rating: PG, for some drinking and drug use.

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Love WCW. This collection of his prose has some really bright parts and some somewhat dull parts and then a couple of politically very incorrect and eyebrow raising parts where you thinkin “is...this...sexual?” And if it IS sexual it’s very bad. Could be off entirely there but it crossed my mind. But I love his style. The last bit from his autobiography is a little bit saccharine but it works and moved me, as a doctor hopeful myself.

[Irma Servatius · Rating 4 out of 5]

personally discouraged by his poetry, but was told by a friend to give his prose a look.
Didn't read all of these, but read Old Doc Rivers" and "The Girl With the Pimply Face" both of which really made an impression and were beautifully written. (had to get into the flow of reading, at first the writing seems disjoint and confusing, but then you find the logic of it, and can make sense of the narrative)

[Branden Z · Rating 4 out of 5]

More grim and gruesome than I expected; an unsanitary stench permeates the book. Though the subjects were often tough to chew and the optimism spare, it was a book worth finishing. Beneath the stench lies a stark love.

[Venky · Rating 3 out of 5]

More often than not, there is an unfortunate yet unavoidable disconnect between what we do for a living and how we actually desire to lead our lives. This divergence is due to a total lack of convergence between passion and purpose. This absence of alignment, gradual at first, and enveloping at the end, leads to a resigned acceptance of what is, and a perpetually gnawing and wistful regret of what could have been. As Doctor William Carlos Williams optimistically illustrates in this collection of short stories, it is possible to evade the scythe of frustration by cleverly blending profession and passion. Desirous of being a poet and an author, yet required to discharge a noble duty of catering to the physiological ailments of a poor and underprivileged section of the populace in Rutherford, New Jersey, Williams amalgamated his writing skills with his invaluable experience of dealing with and treating his patients. The result, a burnished collection of stories and poems representing the voices of the healer, the healed, the helpless and the hopeless.

“The Doctor Stories” is a unique assemblage of stories that trigger a complete range of emotions in the reader. A whole gamut of sentiments ranging from euphoria to exasperation and anger to anxiety rack the reader as she gets completely lost in the lives of the diseased. The protagonist in “Old Doc Rivers” is a doctor who once having attained the status of invincibility falls prey to an unshakeable vulnerability that is addiction. Before the vice of dope reduces the once formidable doctor to a pathetic wretch, he strides the medical profession like Lazarus himself. Poverty is an apparent and common thread that binds stories together. It is also not hard for the reader to hazard a guess that many of the stores are but Doctor Williams’s own experiences with his patients. A great number of them could hardly afford to pay him any fees. The family in “The Girl With a Pimply Face” try to finagle their doctor in treating not only a sick baby but also its mother and sister.

“The Use of Force” spews staccato like sentences as the story proceeds in a breakneck fashion from its commencement to conclusion. A doctor is called by a desperate couple to take a look at their daughter. The obstinate and vexatious girl perched on her father’s lap refuses to allow the doctor to examine her inflamed tonsils. When coaxing and coercion fail to do the trick, the doctor is forced to use blunt force that results in the little girl clamping down hard on her tongue and drawing blood. “In a final unreasoning assault I overpowered the child’s neck and jaws. I forced the heavy silver spoon back of her teeth and down her throat till she gagged. And there it was – both tonsils covered with membrane.”

The simple yet profound beauty of imagism manifests itself in a most magnificent form in many stories. Doctors called at all times of the day and night to make house calls find themselves surrounded by an environ of minimalism. Houses seem to shrink upon themselves as there is barely room to maneuverer. The only bed in a few homes is the one in which a terminally ill patient with nary a hope of recovery, is at rest, Unruly, uncouth and uncivilized children keep running all around the house and obstructing the path of the doctor. Williams was actively helping his neighbourhood combat the pernicious menace of ill health during the Great Depression in the late 1920s and the early 1930s. Thus, the depiction of squalor and depravity comes as no great surprise to the reader.
Williams abhors verbiage for stunning economy. The complex makes way for the simple and the reader is transported into a world of pain and hope. The baby girl in “Jean Beicke” abandoned to both its fate and the benevolence of a care home deceives the nurses and doctors by displaying an excellent progress as she battles illness. But the happiness of the care home is abruptly and vengefully cut short when the little girl develops inexplicable complications and breathes her last. An autopsy reveals a highly treatable disorder that has been unfortunately overlooked by the tireless doctors working overtime to treat the child. “Well , Jean didn’t get well. We did everything we knew how to do except the right thing. She carried on for another two – no I think it was three weeks – longer. A couple of times her temperature shot up to a hundred and eight. Of course we knew then it was the end.”

In addition to the brutal portrayal of the collision of social classes, Williams’s own moral ambiguity and ethical ambivalence invokes more than a slight consternation in the reader. Objectification of women, in the examination room and on the examination table, finds a disturbingly casual expression in more stories than one. An unnamed physician expressing disappointment at the ‘flat’ breasts of one of his patients is totally cringeworthy. Whether Williams was paying homage to the mores of his time, or he was just exhibiting a repulsive degree of condescension and perversion, such notions do not cut ice with me, and with none of his readers, I would assume and hope.
An unnamed physician in a story refuses to heed the call of a working-class couple across town whereas another story has a doctor lamenting the loss of a Rutherford child to disease and comparing the lost soul to a “born garbage hustler.” These are references and tropes that threaten to take the sheen and shine out of other genuinely excellent stories.

“The Doctor Stories” is a river that meanders luxuriously and purposefully and from whose banks both the prosperous and the pauper alike seek and find solace. However the river also makes some unnecessary and unfortunate detours, in whose wake is gathered garbage threatening to cause pollution.

[Οδυσσέας Μουζίλης · Rating 5 out of 5]

Υποχρεωτική ανάγνωση για τους υγειονομικούς 😛

https://pepperlines.blogspot.com/2021...

[haley armor · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting but i’m really sick of the modernist patten of “let’s switch perspectives mid paragraph and not tell haley”

[Jennyfer Galdino · Rating 5 out of 5]

"... the peace of mind that comes from adopting the patient's condition as one's own to be struggled with toward a solution during those few minutes or that hour or those trying days when we are searching for causes, trying to relate this to that to build a reasonable basis for action which really gives us our peace."

[Dave · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was never a big fan of WCW when I was reading modern poetry for the first time. Somehow, he never clicked for me--too plain or simple or something. But I remember reading his story, "The Use of Force," and being impressed and disturbed by it. And thirty years later, it still jumps out at me. All of these stories have immediacy, incredibly sharp detail, and a naked honesty about the doctor and all his patients. Along with "The Use of Force," I will never forget "Old Doc Rivers" (which is nowhere near a heartwarming story), or "The Girl With the Pimply Face." Simply, fearlessly truthful. I should look at the poetry again.

That is why as a writer I have never felt that medicine interfered with me but rather that it was my very food and drink, the very thing which made it possible to write. Was I not interested in man? There the thing was, right in front of me. I could touch it, smell it. It was myself, naked, just as it was, without a lie telling itself to me in its own terms. Oh, I knew it wasn't for the most part giving me anything very profound, but it was giving me terms, basic terms with which I could spell out matters as profound as I cared to think of.

[Mack · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's really hard for me to even know what to make of this book. Given Williams' background as a poet, it's no surprise how evocative some of these stories are just through his sparing and wise choice of words. Still, if I'm being honest, my main takeaway from this book was "How in the name of Christ did this guy and everyone he talks about decide to go into the medical field?" Bedside manner or even basic decency seems nonexistent in these stories. On the one hand, it's an interesting look into the lives of a particularly sociopathic and callous practitioners following the Hippocratic oath with their eyes firmly rolled into the backs of their heads. But on the other, I was usually too distracted with the sheer lack of empathy Williams and his subjects had for their patients to glean much from the stories as a whole. His poems and the letter from his son at the end of the book were both pretty great and "Old Doc Rivers" reads almost like a Breece D'J Pancake story. I'm inspired to finally get around to Williams' poetry after this. I'm glad to have read this but I'm far gladder this guy isn't my doctor.

[Mia · Rating 4 out of 5]

William Carlos Williams is one of my favorite physician authors. In addition to being a fantastic poet, his writings about his life as a country doctor are nothing short of phenomenal. You can tell he sat and wrote in the late evenings about his daily events, not only about his actions, but also detail about his emotions and his patient's predicaments. The way Williams practiced medicine in the early part of the 20th century is a testament to the quality of care all doctors should aim for. His work involved numerous housecalls in New Jersey where he lived, tirelessly caring for patients with meager incomes and many times with no means of communication except for examination (many of his patients were immigrants of some kind). This book shows a different side of William Carlos Williams than simply what we learn of him in high school English class.

A great book.

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Several Vignettes that convey Williams' experiences as a doctor working in a poor neighborhood in New Jersey at the beginning of the 20th century.

For those looking for the next big thing, manicured by an expert marketing team, you won't find it here. Some of these stories may even be boorish or cumbersome. But if you're looking for well-written stories by a master craftsman who knew what is was like to be in the trenches, working with drug addicted doctors who worked best while doped up or patients with their own unique life philosophy, if you're looking for down-'n-dirt, just plain old good, solid writing, then this one's for you.

Enjoy, even if you're not a doctor or nurse.

[Evelyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

A compilation of autobiographical short stories, a selection from the author’s autobiography, and several poems describing the gritty realities of practicing medicine during the first half of the twentieth century in an urban low income industrial city in New Jersey. The stories are pointed and well-written with their blunt and unsparing descriptions of the lives and illnesses of the urban poor and immigrants, and the harsh realities and choices faced by a physician practicing medicine in that environment.

The book rates 4.5 stars.

[Shin Gaku · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best short stories book I have ever read. So moving and insightful. Experiences of his doctor work are described in rich details. He compassnates the poor pepole and dose his best to save their life. In him Poet and doctor are not seperated but compensate each other. This is amazing. His works are undoubtedly master piece and also his life is a feat full of love and tenderness.

[James Winter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Look at this more as an anthology than a collection and you won't be disappointed. But if you're looking to enjoy Williams' work based on the context of collections of stories and poetry, you'll wish for another text. The competency and scope of his writing is lost in this little book, although I'm sure as a teaching text for med students this is a good primer for class discussion.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love reading physician authors, and it was fun reading the short snippets of cases in Dr. WCW’s life. I’ve enjoyed his poetry but I’ve never read his short stories, so this was a fun piece! His descriptions of his patients (he treated a lot of immigrants) was dated unfortunately, which cost him some stars. If you enjoyed the rawness of House of God by Samuel Shem, you’ll enjoy this book too!

[Doug Wells · Rating 3 out of 5]

Have heard about William Carlos Williams for years, this is my first read. Ultimately, I was unimpressed with both the writing and tone. That might be how a doctor thinks when they are with patients, but I don't feel better knowing it

[Phil Soffe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This a great selection of fascinating stories (and some poetry) giving insight into medicine in the early twentieth century. Williams has a style that's direct, memorable and powerful. It's surprising that he isn't more famous.

[Ashton Trimble · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting and honest insight into the mind of a doctor, but slightly outdated. Very well written!

[Eric · Rating 4 out of 5]

So unique and human... a perspective we'll likely never get a better version of.

[Craig · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyed the poems more than the stories.

[Kelly]

Not to my taste

[John Vanderslice · Rating 4 out of 5]

A curious and revealing set of prose pieces (and a few poems) by Williams. What comes through in the pieces, as well as the introduction by Robert Coles and the affectionate afterword by Williams's son, is exactly how hard working a doctor he was. I mean, everyone knows that being a doctor was his profession, but we think of Williams today in only one light: a towering mid-century American poet, one of the three or four most important American poets of the century. A writer who produced not just a book-length masterpiece (Paterson) and hundreds, if not thousands, of smaller individual poems, but also a fair amount of prose, including a volume of autobiography. And on top of all that, he kept up regular correspondence with other leading writers of the day. And yet, until he was wracked with health issues in the late 40s, Williams was working long and exhausting hours as a family physician. Just to read about his schedule is daunting, much less to live it! The people in his community who knew him, and the fellow medical professionals he worked with, only ever saw him as a competent and kindly doctor. Most didn't know or care about his poetry. Some of the doctors he knew knew that he wrote poetry, but they just thought of it as this odd personal habit Bill Williams kept up, nothing that would affect the world, not like doctoring! Only his family, sounds like, saw all of it: the hours of being a doctor and the hours of manic typing. I enjoyed this book for the insight it provides into the the actions and energies that actually filled the actual days of the great poet. It's also an insight to medical practices at the time (30 and 40s) and the lives of the working-class populations that Williams served.