The Empathy Exams

Jamison explores themes I am fascinated with, things that are profoundly true, but the essays felt shadowed by the style. She seems enamored with her style and demands that we be too. Charles D'Ambrosio's Loitering was maybe my favorite book I read this year. It's easy to tell that he was the teacher and she the student.

I came to the party ill prepared. I thought I was signing up for a breezy pop-science read along the lines of the Psychopath Test. Instead it's a more thoughtful collection of personal essays. Maybe if I slowed down and tried to unravel the narrative I'd enjoy it more but instead I kept getting irritated by the oppressive, navel gazing, grad school, verbal gymnastics.

Despite the fact that this is not a perfect book full of perfect essays, I liked it quite a lot. I fancy myself a student of pain and suffering and it seems Leslie Jamison does as well. If it seems she is focusing too much on herself and her pain, maybe that's an even greater reason to read her book. One can only suffer inside oneself, after all, and we must learn to validate the suffering of others.

Anyway, A+ topic, B content.