comment on style/ language

The author has chosen to avoid technical terms in her writing. Elf is hospitalized in the psych ward and must have some sort of diagnoses such as manic depressive or bipolar but Toews steers away from such labels. Instead, she uses Elf’s own words. Elf is suffering from “overwhelming sorrow,” a surfeit of emotion not a disease. Toews is, with such language, aiming at a general audience. She is also using language to show the person behind the label. Suicide is one of those things where it is very hard to know how to deal with it appropriately. Toews is asking what is crazy and how do we know? By avoiding labelling Elf she is able to explore the possibility that individual rights should be extended to those we now label as mentally ill (a term not found in Toews novel).