The Illness Lesson by Clare Beams

Caroline has received an unusually sophisticated education for an 18th century female, because of her idealistic father.  What she has not received is any training on how to function in society as a woman because her mother died when she was young.  Caroline's father had once tried to start an intellectual commune, which failed, but now he is eager to use the property for the commune to start a school for girls to give them the same kind of education Caroline has received.  The school starts off with eight young teenage girls, and seems to be going well, but then one girl, the "queen bee", starts having strange fits and spells.  Soon the other girls also start to have strange symptoms.  In an attempt to save the school, Caroline's father brings in a well known doctor who says he understands the problem completely and knows the correct treatment.  The men who run the school trust the doctor, but Caroline questions whether the cure is much worse than the ailment.

I read this book because one of our faithful patrons at the library read it and was appalled by it. It is a new book and got lots of attention and good reviews.  I found the book disturbing and heavy handed. There is a lot of imagery around the color red, referring clearly to female physiology and cycles, and Beams always portrays it was menacing and evil.  Caroline sees herself as defective because she has never been able to marry. (spoiler) The "cure" the men impose on the girls in the end involves stimulating them to orgasm, to "release their built up tensions."  The scenes where they are applying this treatment are terrible to read, and left me feeling violated myself.  I am sure that was what the author was going for.  She was clearly wanting the highest impact to get across her message.  It felt emotionally manipulative.

That said, I actually can see why it got some good reviews.  It is artistically written and very thought provoking.  It seemed that the author was trying to say something about how modern society has forced women to abandon traditional rolls, and as a result women have gone a little crazy.  What a novel and bold view to take.  Philosophical feminist types could go back and forth about this book for hours, debating what it means.  

The patron that complained about the book has not yet filed a formal complaint.   I have decided to keep the book in my library, but  I did give the patron the concession of taking it off the "New Books" display so now nobody is likely to find it unless they are looking for it. (2020, 288 p)