Gillian Rose (1) (1947–1995)

This book was originally released back in 1995 and has gotten many glowing reviews since then. Gillian Rose was a noted philosopher from Britain who had decided to write a philosophical memoir of her life and her approaching death from cancer. She focuses on the power of love during many different and trying times in her life. It was understandably quite moving at times, but mostly I didn’t feel that I was connecting with her writing. Her sections about philosophy seemed rather distanced and cold. While the more personal parts about cancer and her medical treatments—other than a few very intense pages—also seemed distanced. Maybe I was expecting too much from an older book, as these types of nearing-death memoirs are much more common nowadays, but this book seemed to be something she was reporting on, and not as much of something she was personally feeling.

In the end, she died before the book was published. There are some seriously gory details about her surgeries, where she had much of her intestines removed, as well as a hysterectomy, and a number of other serious surgeries. I have read a number of these nearing-death memoirs, and they are obviously one of the hardest kinds of books in which to achieve the right tone, but Love’s Work seemed to be something that Rose wanted to keep some distance from. Because I think about death so much, I can imagine writing such a book myself, but actually doing it still seems a staggering achievement. Gillian Rose was incredibly brave to write this book and I’m a fool to be critical of her, but I’m just writing what I felt as I was reading her words.… (mer)