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A major commonality between our fictional protagonist Doctor Bearing and the very real Audre Lorde, was their experience of navigating cancer treatments within healthcare institutions, and their ability to advocate for themselves- though their ability to do so, differed quite greatly. While the nature of the medical neglect the both of them faced varied (In that Doctor Bearing was essentially seen as a guinea-pig by the medical team that surrounded her, and Lorde faced unique challenges navigating the healthcare facilities as a Black woman) both had similar methods of going through treatment, in that both Lorde and Bearing's methodology of going through the process was to do a lot of research on their diagnosis and find quantitative ways to help them through recovery. But while Lorde's research tended to be more diaristic in nature, Bearing's research consisted mostly of just learning more about her condition while removing herself completely from the condition that existed within her. Whereas Lorde was able to juxtapose the medicine and the humanity- recognizing that it was a critical part of her own recovery- Something that Bearing was unable to understand, until the very end of her treatment.

Which is why the key commonality of both Bearing and Lorde, is also somehow their greatest difference. Because a critical part of Lorde's method of recording what was her happening to her and her body, was staying fully present and processing what was happening to her. While Professor Bearing's incessant questioning was really just a coping mechanism for her to feel in control of the situation, and thus not fully acknowledging the disease that was slowly spreading it's roots throughout her. So while Lorde practiced self-compassion as a critical tool to get her through her treatments, Vivian simply separated herself from the condition, until it was too late.

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Commonality: The biggest commonality these two stories share is the battle of death. It is interesting how both of them experience similar feelings. In both the Cancer Journals they talk about either giving up life against cancer or fighting through the different medical procedures, but they both “know all about life and death.” (Edson) Along with that, both of them faced similar treatment of not always feeling heard while they fought alone against the hard facts of the relationship between cancer and science, with the lack of humanities incorporated in it.

Differences: The most significant difference was the purpose of their teachings. Before Lorde had cancer, she advocated and spoke out to educate those around her, and so did Edson, but they did it for very different reasons and with very different approaches. While Lorde used her words in the form of poetry, Edson used her words as power, giving little grace to her students as she spoke to the class rather than with them. One specific quote emphasizes this idea: "The young doctor, like the senior scholar, prefers research to humanity,” (Edson). Now that she is no longer the one in power, she is seeing how dangerous power can be. Often in power, you fail to see the humanistic aspects of life, you only see the facts, and while Edson's career started like that, Lorde’s started with providing humanities before facts.

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Both 'The Cancer Journals' and 'Wit' vividly depict the physical and emotional toll of cancer, from the first hand perspective of authors who themselves battled cancer. Audre Lorde and Margaret Edson's personal encounters with cancer deeply influenced their literary work. This is a unique perspective, where the struggles faced by the protagonists may resonate with individuals worldwide who navigate complex healthcare systems and face disparities in access to treatment and support, allowing certain audiences to feel a deeper connection to the writing.

Although both authors battled cancer, a major difference in their pieces was that Lorde's was a nonfiction memoir, whereas Edson's work was a fictional narrative inspired by her experience. While Edson's theatrical play emphasizes the performative nature of medicine and calls for empathy, Lorde's essayistic style delves into the depths of identity and societal critique. Both narrative forms contribute uniquely to our understanding of cancer's physical, emotional, and sociopolitical dimensions.

While their works differ in narrative form and perspective, they converge in their ability to humanize the cancer journey and shed light on the complexities of global health.  In doing so, they remind us that the battle against cancer is not just a medical one; it is a deeply human one that transcends borders and cultures.

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One difference is that Vivian does not seem to value a strong support system. When Nurse Susie asks if Vivian wants to inform anyone about her cancer she says no, and Nurse Susie seems to be more concerned than Vivian about no one is visiting her. Whereas Lorde writes a lot about how her support system was particularly important to her and how they helped her a lot through the recovery, especially talking to someone with similar experiences.

One similarity I noticed from both women’s perspectives is that they both agree that the medical institution is not very humane. In both stories, the doctors do not take much time to get to know the patients. They only care about medical history. Especially at the very end of Wit, the medical student Jason calls Vivian “Research” when she dies instead of caring that she chooses to be left dead and not resuscitated (Edson 82).

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Both pieces of writing that delve into the different experiences Lorde and Professor Bearing faced while suffering with life-threatening illnesses and with striking similarity explore the human condition while ill. These texts show the emotional and psychological challenges that come with these types of illnesses along with how their treatment in the hospital affects them. Lorde experienced mistreatment with being a black woman getting treatment, while Bearing was often wanted to be kept alive just to be used as a test subject for research. The texts both end with the emphasis on the need of caring and more humane treatment, especially for those with life-threatening illnesses.

A notable difference between these two works lies in the different perspectives these stories are told from. Bearing presents the first-person account from the perspective of a highly educated and well-known professor who is also a cancer patient. Bearing, who always had a very harsh teaching style, looks back at the end of the story and sees in her suffering the difference a more humane perspective makes. Audre Lorde, on the other hand, is a Black feminist, poet and activist so she is able to provide a unique perspective that goes not only into the physical parts of her cancer but the social and cultural aspects.

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A very obvious similarity between Wit and Audre Lorde’s Cancer Journals was the lack of connection between the patients and the doctors. Dr. Bearing was often asked how she was feeling but the words were more asked at her not asked out of genuine care. The doctors seemed to view her as just another case, just another cancer patient much like Lorde described not paying much mind to her state other than the numbers on her chart. Both women describe the loneliness of hospital beds, and the dehumanizing feeling of not being seen. They both craved the feeling of human connection.

A difference I noticed between the two works was the narrative; Edsons work read as an almost fantasy piece where so much of it was lived out in her memory and imagination rather than how Lorde wrote hers in nonfiction voice. Lorde and Eddson convey these different narratives through the use of analepsis. Lorde takes you back to the past as it happened, while Edson mixes the past with her present self, switching between a carefree younger version of herself and her current self.

Both voices were powerful in telling the message of healthcare having become almost robotic caring more about the numbers and treatment then the patient. Both women wrote strong stories that tell the story of health care and use them to advocate for a more “humane” way of patient care, most notably for me the presence of the nurse, in Edson's story, set an example for how healthcare workers could treat patient care and how much of a positive effect it had on the patient. Proving how its not hard to learn to care about the people being treated, it does not take much for them to not feel like just another patient.

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One difference I thought was notable was the attitudes in both woman while battling cancer. Lorde placed an emphasis on showing her readers the pain and mental toll that cancer brought her and gives off a sense of connection from the beginning. From the start, she shares raw details and her true emotions through journals entries describing drains and thoughts of sadness. All of the emotions she was feeling made sense given what she had been through. It made me feel like she came to terms with the diagnosis more easily. Vivian on the other hand is very cold and copes with humor from the start, a more unexpected way to deal with cancer treatment. She makes jokes to herself about a certain nurse being stupid and gets a good laugh out of it. We don't learn that she has a vulnerable side until significantly into the text. It shows that coping mechanisms vary from case to case.

Something I noticed that was similar was that each woman was a woman who was in academia in some way, being a teacher for Vivian and a poet for Lorde. Both were thoughtful and well-educated woman. This furthers the idea that even if two people come from a similar place--or occupation in their case--people all will process feelings differently. The two women had to work through how to deal with how to define themselves and their place within their jobs even after becoming weaker. Lorde says, "I feel so unequal to what I always handled before"(11). Vivian had been hard on her students, therefore, it did not fit her prior personality to be sickly. She also tries to prove herself, being sure to tell people who she was, "I have made an immeasurable contribution to the discipline of English literature”(20). Lorde also questions how she will continue to write and inspire people when she was in the hospital.

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In both Wit and The Cancer Journals, the narrators use language to try and explain feeling. Vivian and Lorde try to capture the pain and despair cancer brought them.

However, as Lorde progresses through her cancer, she gets stronger, her writing more pointed. But Vivian gets more and more scared, lost, and tired. She say, "I'm a scholar. Or I was when I had shoes, when I had eyebrows" (68). It seems like Vivian feels that she is loosing her personhood in her fight with cancer. But Lorde finds her womanhood in cancer. It strengthens her.

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A similarity that stood out to me was the unbearable feeling of loneliness the women experienced. Edson details the feeling of time standing still and the weight of a seemingly never ending silence. Additionally, Lorde described the isolation and distance she felt from the doctors, nurses, friends, etc, who surrounded her. They both experienced rejection and lacked humanity from their doctors, nurses, and people who experienced similar bouts. The majority of their cancer journeys were essentially spent alone, in the way that they didn’t have responsive outlets for their emotional battles. They both had to rely on themselves and attempted to gain some relief through writing their stories.

A difference I noticed was in their goals of education with their stories. Although they both proudly claim their identities as educators, Lourde left me with the impression of keeping her journal for the sake of others while Edson was more focused on her own self soothing. I think Lorde being a Black, lesbian poet was familiar with the feeling of being ostracized and stigmatized. Because of this familiarity, she possibly felt it was her duty to journal her experience to be used as a point of reference for women who share a similar identity. As for Edson, I think her recounting of cancer was more of an outlet for her peace of mind and not for the use of others experiencing a similar battle.

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Both 'The Cancer Journals' and 'Wit' share the stories of two women struggling with cancer in unique and similar ways. During this time, they both experienced the feelings of death (inside and outside), loneliness, and fear at the start, as well as the feeling of realization at the end. Lorde found out that the ordeals of cancer treatment and mastectomy were shrouded in silence for women, which was even more isolating for her as a black lesbian woman. But Lorde had some supportive people around her, while Bearing went through all of these alone. “In truth, it is like this: You cannot imagine how time can be so still. It hangs. It weighs. And yet, there is so little of it. It goes so slowly. And yet it is so scarce” (Bearing 35). In this quote from Bearing, you can feel how scared she is and how she feels about being that close to death. We witnessed the same feeling from Lorde, where she says, “The terrible thing is that nothing goes past me these days, nothing. Each horror remains like a steel vise in my flesh, another magnet to the flame” (Lorde 11).
In my opinion, both stories also raise the issue of how a patient deals emotionally with cancer and the importance of how patients are treated by medical professionals managing their care. (Healthcare is not just treating a disease throughout a medical procedure; it also addresses the patient's anxiety, psychological status, personal, social, and spiritual factors that affect the healing process.)

For me, both stories carry the same themes of two brave and passionate women who never give up on empowering themselves and others. The only difference was how the storytelling was different for both and how the two women approached their experience with cancer. Both women were well educated and knew how to express their feelings. Bearing’s did not show a lot of her inner feelings, while Lorde gave a unique perspective on her emotions and difficulties in the book.

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In the beginning of her novel, Audre Lorde discusses how the way in which a woman reacts to a crisis in their life is based on “ who she is and how her life has been lived.” (Lorde 1) A person’s experience and reaction to illness is personal given the intersectionality of one's identity with their disease and its treatment. This remains potentially true in the case of Lorde’s and Bearing’s experiences.

From diagnosis to treatment, the women’s experience throughout their illness varied. After being diagnosed with cancer, Lorde read countless sources on various treatment options and personally decided how to pursue her course of treatment. Bearing took more of a “backseat approach”; she accepted the first course of treatment recommended by her doctor without quarrel. Lorde had a very supportive group of people to help her through surgery and post-op care. Being unmarried, childless, and having mainly professional relationships, Bearing went through the experience of cancer basically alone. Although the treatment of their disease differed, the humanistic care that they received from professionals aligned. Being seen as a patient, not a person, was a common theme uniting the two experiences. Both women experienced cancer physically, psychologically, and personally, yet were only seen for their physical conditions. The women wished that their providers would “take more interest in personal contact” given the deeply personal experience that cancer pushed onto them. (Edson 58)

Not only were the experiences of Lorde and Bearing different, but so were their means of storytelling. Perhaps due to the limitations of playwriting, Bearing was less evocative about her inner feelings associated with cancer. Bearing’s story, by nature of a play, followed a stricter timeline and focused less on the thoughts behind events, but on the events themselves. Bearing’s internal thoughts spanned from her academic thoughts, to her profession and childhood whereas Lorde wrote strictly about her illness. Naturally given the characteristics of a journal, Lorde’s account was highly internally personal and vulnerable. Lorde visually explained the pain she felt by cancer, its treatment, and the medical system in which she was treated within. Despite such differences, both spoke profoundy about illness and its implications.

An aspect of Lorde’s writing which I loved as both a reader and student of the Health Humanities, was her component of “why.” Lorded explained why she was writing what she was writing - to break silence and offer insight into the intersectionality which has a hand in medicine. For instance, although both authors looked at the disconnection between medicine and patient care, Lorde did so with greater directness. Lorde called out the experience by name and reflected on it personally whereas Bearing only “explained” the phenomenon by explaining the experience itself. However, both stories are true works of art in their own right. Depicting the complexities of the patient perspective, they are honest literary references to real experiences of lived illness.

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For whom the Bell Tolls

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.

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One similarity is that both of them would like the people that surround them to be more kind. The doctors at the hospital used to ignore the humanity part (they were asking Vivian about her research and her work rather than asking her about how she was feeling) and only focused on general knowledge. ( Audre Lorde's "Cancer of Journals": The nurses were very put out by my ruckus and sent me back to the floor early.").

One difference is the stage of cancer. Vivian is diagnosed with Stage IV metastatic ovarian cancer and is offered an experimental treatment which she accepts.  Also, her attitude and hope towards the fight with cancer is very different than Audre Lorde's due to the fact that Vivian accepts the DNR as a last option.

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The clearest commonality is that both Audre Lorde and Vivian Bearing are academics who experience cancer. Lorde is diagnosed with breast cancer and takes us on her journey post-mastectomy where she describes and analyses her experience through an intersectional lens as that is what her academic area focuses on. Bearing is diagnosed with stage four ovarian cancer, and also offers the the reader an analytical perspective on her experience. Both of these authors are facing cancer that is most common to occur within women/people with breasts and a uterus. Furthermore, both women were not given enough (which is a relative term) care by the medical providers.

However, there is a huge distinction between the two stories as Lorde approaches her journals through an intersectional and humanistic lens while Bearing takes a more informational and medical approach. By this I mean that although texts discuss the medical challenges and experiences of cancer, Lorde focuses more on emotion and the support systems she had. Bearing, instead, has a heavier emphasis on the health aspect of global health humanities.

Still, both stories illustrate the importance of global health humanities in their own way: Lorde through showing the reader how the emotional support she received from other black women and women who have had a mastectomy helped her battle cancer, and Bearing demonstrated the lack of it. Both women lacked that kind of care from their doctors, but Lorde had an external support system of friends and family while the person who was the most concerned for Bearing was her nurse. At times, it seemed that Bearings personality and "uncompromising" nature of being a professor led her to view herself as an experiment for cancer research. She seemed to play along with the doctors for her own sanity, but there were instances where her craving for human connection shone through. The health care professionals treated Bearing as a lab rat instead of a human being. They did not see her anything more than another cancer patient to study and further research. This can be seen when she tries to get the courage to ask her doctor questions about fear and death, and instead of providing emotional support and acknowledging her vulnerability, he asks "Are you experiencing confusion? Short-term memory loss?" as if looking for new symptoms to add to her chart.