Joe Wood is currently an Affiliate Researcher at King’s College London. He has worked in the English department at King’s and as part of the Glasgow End of Life Studies Group at the University of Glasgow. His work on Cicely Saunders and narrative at the end of life has led to collaborative work with St Christopher’s Hospice and the Royal College of Nursing.

• AcknowledgementsSeries Editor's PrefaceIntroduction: Pinning Down the IntangiblePart I. Holism1. Saunders’ Use of ‘Total Pain’2. Uses and Definitions of ‘Total Pain’ After Saunders: Many Holisms3. Criticising ‘Total Pain’: Definite Concept or Ambiguous Term?Part II. Narrative4. ‘Total Pain’ and Narrative Medicine: A Sense of an Ending5. Defending a Narrative ‘Total Pain’: Narrative vs. Narrating6. Using Narratives to Express ‘Total Pain’Part III. Fragments and Silence7. Quotations and Fragments: The Limits of Narrative8. Photographs: Looking for/at ‘Total Pain’9. No Words: Presence and ‘Total Pain’Conclusion: ‘Total Pain’ NowBibliographyIndex

Pain, dying, loss – bleak topics for most of us. And yet, with sharp and delicate attentiveness, Wood shows how we might adventure with ‘total pain’, as Cicely Saunders did, as a pathway back to our inescapable vulnerability and interdependence. The value of bearing witness to suffering, the extending of personhood beyond the individual, the recognition of pain in its many forms, outreach the deathbed. These are lessons that speak to the weight of genocidal and environmental catastrophes as much as to loving accompaniment as the most radical form of care.

Joe Wood is currently an Affiliate Researcher at King’s College London. He has worked in the English department at King’s and as part of the Glasgow End of Life Studies Group at the University of Glasgow. His work on Cicely Saunders and narrative at the end of life has led to collaborative work with St Christopher’s Hospice and the Royal College of Nursing.

• AcknowledgementsSeries Editor's PrefaceIntroduction: Pinning Down the IntangiblePart I. Holism1. Saunders’ Use of ‘Total Pain’2. Uses and Definitions of ‘Total Pain’ After Saunders: Many Holisms3. Criticising ‘Total Pain’: Definite Concept or Ambiguous Term?Part II. Narrative4. ‘Total Pain’ and Narrative Medicine: A Sense of an Ending5. Defending a Narrative ‘Total Pain’: Narrative vs. Narrating6. Using Narratives to Express ‘Total Pain’Part III. Fragments and Silence7. Quotations and Fragments: The Limits of Narrative8. Photographs: Looking for/at ‘Total Pain’9. No Words: Presence and ‘Total Pain’Conclusion: ‘Total Pain’ NowBibliographyIndex

Pain, dying, loss – bleak topics for most of us. And yet, with sharp and delicate attentiveness, Wood shows how we might adventure with ‘total pain’, as Cicely Saunders did, as a pathway back to our inescapable vulnerability and interdependence. The value of bearing witness to suffering, the extending of personhood beyond the individual, the recognition of pain in its many forms, outreach the deathbed. These are lessons that speak to the weight of genocidal and environmental catastrophes as much as to loving accompaniment as the most radical form of care.

Joe Wood is currently an Affiliate Researcher at King’s College London. He has worked in the English department at King’s and as part of the Glasgow End of Life Studies Group at the University of Glasgow. His work on Cicely Saunders and narrative at the end of life has led to collaborative work with St Christopher’s Hospice and the Royal College of Nursing.

• AcknowledgementsSeries Editor's PrefaceIntroduction: Pinning Down the IntangiblePart I. Holism1. Saunders’ Use of ‘Total Pain’2. Uses and Definitions of ‘Total Pain’ After Saunders: Many Holisms3. Criticising ‘Total Pain’: Definite Concept or Ambiguous Term?Part II. Narrative4. ‘Total Pain’ and Narrative Medicine: A Sense of an Ending5. Defending a Narrative ‘Total Pain’: Narrative vs. Narrating6. Using Narratives to Express ‘Total Pain’Part III. Fragments and Silence7. Quotations and Fragments: The Limits of Narrative8. Photographs: Looking for/at ‘Total Pain’9. No Words: Presence and ‘Total Pain’Conclusion: ‘Total Pain’ NowBibliographyIndex

Pain, dying, loss – bleak topics for most of us. And yet, with sharp and delicate attentiveness, Wood shows how we might adventure with ‘total pain’, as Cicely Saunders did, as a pathway back to our inescapable vulnerability and interdependence. The value of bearing witness to suffering, the extending of personhood beyond the individual, the recognition of pain in its many forms, outreach the deathbed. These are lessons that speak to the weight of genocidal and environmental catastrophes as much as to loving accompaniment as the most radical form of care.