Theory of Bastards - Q5: Pain

clash_bowley

Frankie was afflicted with severe Endometriosis. I had a friend long ago who had this, and it caused her severe pain, so I understood, but most people have never heard of it. Frankie was shaped by this experience in many ways, even to the freedom from pain she found after her hysterectomy - it shaped her. Did this long discussion of her disease spread throughout the book in flashbacks work for you? Did you believe it? Did you understand Frankie and what she subsequently did better?

RichardAbbott

I thought this was an intriguing and credible facet of the book, and the means chosen for its disclosure worked for me.

Apocryphal

It was an interesting aspect of the book. What thing that ‘Frankie subsequently did’ are you thinking of?

NeilNjae

The experience of pain seemed plausible (it resonates with other chronic pain suffers have told me). On the one hand, it was good to have the representation in the book, and raised awareness of the condition. On the other hand, I'm not sure how it connected to other themes in the book. No other characters suffered pain in a similar way, and the pain itself wasn't a motivation for Frankie (it was something that just got in her way).

Would the book have been diminished without that element? A little, but not much.

clash_bowley

@Apocryphal said:
It was an interesting aspect of the book. What thing that ‘Frankie subsequently did’ are you thinking of?

I was referring to her actions after the hysterectomy, when she was free from the pain.

clash_bowley

@NeilNjae said:
The experience of pain seemed plausible (it resonates with other chronic pain suffers have told me). On the one hand, it was good to have the representation in the book, and raised awareness of the condition. On the other hand, I'm not sure how it connected to other themes in the book. No other characters suffered pain in a similar way, and the pain itself wasn't a motivation for Frankie (it was something that just got in her way).

Would the book have been diminished without that element? A little, but not much.

Hmmm - I thought it was why she was so remote and observant, as she could not share in normal lives, at least she could watch them, and this led directly to her science.

RichardAbbott

@clash_bowley said:

@NeilNjae said:
The experience of pain seemed plausible (it resonates with other chronic pain suffers have told me). On the one hand, it was good to have the representation in the book, and raised awareness of the condition. On the other hand, I'm not sure how it connected to other themes in the book. No other characters suffered pain in a similar way, and the pain itself wasn't a motivation for Frankie (it was something that just got in her way).

Would the book have been diminished without that element? A little, but not much.

Hmmm - I thought it was why she was so remote and observant, as she could not share in normal lives, at least she could watch them, and this led directly to her science.

I agree with this - it shaped the way Frankie looked at the world and her relationships (which were largely non-existent in the present, and largely failures in the past), so arguably she started looking at relationships from a detached biological way as she couldn't make them work in a personal way

clash_bowley

In the words of the immortal Tina Turner, "what's love got to do with it?"