Extraordinary Bodies: Figuring Physical Disability in American Culture and Literature

Rosemarie Garland Thomson has written a book that is groundbreaking and essential reading for anyone interested in the fields of disability theory, disability studies, and literary criticism. She has skillfully examined how the figure of the disabled body has been used in literature in different periods as a marker or boundary line for defining what the "normal" body is or should be. The disabled figure operates to displace anxiety from more "normal" folks, and in the process shows how what we consider to be normal functioning changes across historical periods and cultures. Thomson also compares the disabled figure to the cyborg, as both are figures that are not seen as "natural," and both are places/signifiers where we can then interrogate what the natural is, has been thought to be, and what it could include. This is an excellent book, and should not be missed.