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Imagine a world without sight. Is it dark and gloomy? Is it terrifying and isolating? Or is it simply a state of not seeing, which we have demonised and sentimentalized over the centuries? And why is blindness so frightening?
In this fascinating historical adventure, Broadcaster and author Selina Mills takes us on a journey through the history of blindness in Western Culture to discover that blindness is not so dark after all.
Inspired by her own experience of losing her sight as she forged a successful journalistic career, Life Unseen takes us through a personal and unsentimental historical quest through the lives, stories and achievements of blind people - as well as those sighted people who sought to patronize, demonize and fix them. From the blind poet Homer, through the myths and moralising of early medieval culture to the scientific and medical discoveries of the Enlightenment and modern times, the story of blindness turns out to be a story of our whole culture.
Prologue: Close Your Eyes
Chapter 1: Imagining It - Nandy and Mythic Heroes
Chapter 2: Living With It – Dark Versus Light
Chapter 3: Faking It – False Eyes, False Devils
Chapter 4: Fixing It – The Lure of the Cure
Chapter 5: Learning It – Educating "The Blind"
Chapter 6: Reading It – Pure Fiction
Chapter Seven: Inventing it – Who Decides What You See?
Conclusion: What is Blindness Anyway?
Index
Description
Imagine a world without sight. Is it dark and gloomy? Is it terrifying and isolating? Or is it simply a state of not seeing, which we have demonised and sentimentalized over the centuries? And why is blindness so frightening?
In this fascinating historical adventure, Broadcaster and author Selina Mills takes us on a journey through the history of blindness in Western Culture to discover that blindness is not so dark after all.
Inspired by her own experience of losing her sight as she forged a successful journalistic career, Life Unseen takes us through a personal and unsentimental historical quest through the lives, stories and achievements of blind people - as well as those sighted people who sought to patronize, demonize and fix them. From the blind poet Homer, through the myths and moralising of early medieval culture to the scientific and medical discoveries of the Enlightenment and modern times, the story of blindness turns out to be a story of our whole culture.
