Sweetha Saji is Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Mount Carmel College, Bengaluru. Her areas of research interest include Graphic Medicine and Medical Humanities. She has published over ten research articles in SCI and Scopus indexed journals. She is an ad-hoc reviewer for Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics and BMJ Journal of Medical Humanities. She has presented over 12 research papers at International and National conferences organized by prestigious institutions including the University of Granada, Spain, JNU New Delhi, and IIT Madras.Sathyaraj Venkatesan is Associate Professor of English in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the National Institute of Technology, Trichy (India). He is the author of 6 books and over 90 research publications that span African American literature, health humanities, graphic medicine, film studies, and other literary and culture studies disciplines. He is most recently the co-author of Infertility Comics and Graphic Medicine (2021) and India Retold (2021).

• Introduction 1 Drawing Illness: History, Theory, and the Development of Graphic Medicine2 The Function of Metaphors in Retelling Stories of Illness 3 Mental Illness and the Politics of Representation4 Nobody Memoirs as Counter-Discourse: Bipolar Disorder and its Metaphors5 Visual Metaphors of OCD and Schizophrenia6 Visualizing Fragmented Selves: Conventional and Creative Metaphors of Depression Conclusion

"A brilliant analysis of the ways comics represent the infinite delicacy of human subjectivity, Metaphors of Mental Illness in Graphic Medicine is both a sophisticated meditation on the complexity inherent in the comics artform and a guide to using that complexity as a therapeutic tool. Drs. Saji and Venkatesan’s analysis marks a new level of confidence for Comics Studies, one that stops apologizing for comics’ fundamental difference from prose, poetry, and film and instead recognizes this very difference as a powerful asset for understanding who we are and how we think." William Kuskin, University of Colorado Boulder"A welcome challenge to the binary view of sanity through the lens of comics." Matthew N. Noe, Harvard Medical School "Saji and Venkatesan’s work is essential, illuminating the power of comics to enrich our understanding of subjective mental health experiences, and the impact of those experiences on our daily lives." Nate Powell, National Book Award winning graphic novelist of March

Sweetha Saji is Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Mount Carmel College, Bengaluru. Her areas of research interest include Graphic Medicine and Medical Humanities. She has published over ten research articles in SCI and Scopus indexed journals. She is an ad-hoc reviewer for Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics and BMJ Journal of Medical Humanities. She has presented over 12 research papers at International and National conferences organized by prestigious institutions including the University of Granada, Spain, JNU New Delhi, and IIT Madras.Sathyaraj Venkatesan is Associate Professor of English in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the National Institute of Technology, Trichy (India). He is the author of 6 books and over 90 research publications that span African American literature, health humanities, graphic medicine, film studies, and other literary and culture studies disciplines. He is most recently the co-author of Infertility Comics and Graphic Medicine (2021) and India Retold (2021).

• Introduction 1 Drawing Illness: History, Theory, and the Development of Graphic Medicine2 The Function of Metaphors in Retelling Stories of Illness 3 Mental Illness and the Politics of Representation4 Nobody Memoirs as Counter-Discourse: Bipolar Disorder and its Metaphors5 Visual Metaphors of OCD and Schizophrenia6 Visualizing Fragmented Selves: Conventional and Creative Metaphors of Depression Conclusion

"A brilliant analysis of the ways comics represent the infinite delicacy of human subjectivity, Metaphors of Mental Illness in Graphic Medicine is both a sophisticated meditation on the complexity inherent in the comics artform and a guide to using that complexity as a therapeutic tool. Drs. Saji and Venkatesan’s analysis marks a new level of confidence for Comics Studies, one that stops apologizing for comics’ fundamental difference from prose, poetry, and film and instead recognizes this very difference as a powerful asset for understanding who we are and how we think." William Kuskin, University of Colorado Boulder"A welcome challenge to the binary view of sanity through the lens of comics." Matthew N. Noe, Harvard Medical School "Saji and Venkatesan’s work is essential, illuminating the power of comics to enrich our understanding of subjective mental health experiences, and the impact of those experiences on our daily lives." Nate Powell, National Book Award winning graphic novelist of March

Sweetha Saji is Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Mount Carmel College, Bengaluru. Her areas of research interest include Graphic Medicine and Medical Humanities. She has published over ten research articles in SCI and Scopus indexed journals. She is an ad-hoc reviewer for Journal of Graphic Novels and Comics and BMJ Journal of Medical Humanities. She has presented over 12 research papers at International and National conferences organized by prestigious institutions including the University of Granada, Spain, JNU New Delhi, and IIT Madras.Sathyaraj Venkatesan is Associate Professor of English in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at the National Institute of Technology, Trichy (India). He is the author of 6 books and over 90 research publications that span African American literature, health humanities, graphic medicine, film studies, and other literary and culture studies disciplines. He is most recently the co-author of Infertility Comics and Graphic Medicine (2021) and India Retold (2021).

• Introduction 1 Drawing Illness: History, Theory, and the Development of Graphic Medicine2 The Function of Metaphors in Retelling Stories of Illness 3 Mental Illness and the Politics of Representation4 Nobody Memoirs as Counter-Discourse: Bipolar Disorder and its Metaphors5 Visual Metaphors of OCD and Schizophrenia6 Visualizing Fragmented Selves: Conventional and Creative Metaphors of Depression Conclusion

"A brilliant analysis of the ways comics represent the infinite delicacy of human subjectivity, Metaphors of Mental Illness in Graphic Medicine is both a sophisticated meditation on the complexity inherent in the comics artform and a guide to using that complexity as a therapeutic tool. Drs. Saji and Venkatesan’s analysis marks a new level of confidence for Comics Studies, one that stops apologizing for comics’ fundamental difference from prose, poetry, and film and instead recognizes this very difference as a powerful asset for understanding who we are and how we think." William Kuskin, University of Colorado Boulder"A welcome challenge to the binary view of sanity through the lens of comics." Matthew N. Noe, Harvard Medical School "Saji and Venkatesan’s work is essential, illuminating the power of comics to enrich our understanding of subjective mental health experiences, and the impact of those experiences on our daily lives." Nate Powell, National Book Award winning graphic novelist of March