Point of View

All of the six works collected in Intoxicated By My Illness are told from the point of view of the author Anatole Broyard. However, they were not all written at the same time and present different perspectives based on the period in which they were conceived. Parts One to Four were all written during Broyard's tragically brief battle with prostate cancer and, therefore, are told from the enlightened, pensive view point of a dying man. Here, Broyard reflects on his life, the nature of dying, and the raw beauty of illness. His point of view is that of a man faced with death, straining to see beyond the veil into oblivion.

Parts Five and Six differ from the first four in that they were written before Broyard fell sick. In "Part Five: The Literature of Death 1981-1982", Broyard takes on the keen-eyed, pointed view point...