The Shaking Woman

While speaking at a memorial event for her father, Siri Hustvedt suffered a violent seizure from the neck down. She managed to finish her talk and the paroxysms stopped, but not for good. Again and again she found herself a victim of the shudders. What had happened? Was it the onset of epilepsy? Was it a hysterical seizure or a bizarre form of panic attack? Hustvedt decides to chronicle her search for the shaking woman. Her exploration takes the reader on a journey into the offices of psychiatrists, neurologists, and psychoanalysts. It unearths stories and theories from the annals of medical history, contemporary brain research, as well as literature and philosophy. She discovers that although each discipline offers a distinct perspective on the problem, there is no ready solution. This is a book about the mysteries of illness and the complexities of diagnosis. In THE SHAKING WOMAN Hustvedt synthesizes her personal experience and years of research into a seamless narrative that investigates the age-old dilemmas of the mental and the physical, the mind and the body and what it means to be human.

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