"W;t" - a commentary on the medical profession

by lhansing (student)

University Degree Linguistics, Classics and related subjects

The Irony of W;t

As the play begins, the narrator and patient, Vivian tells the audience that she dies and that the story is funny. She sets the stage for the story’s inherent irony. The author calls irony, wit. She uses it to reveal the flaws of academia while, also, congratulating education. W;t is a poignant commentary on the medical profession because it contrasts the solution-base outlook of medicine with the innate desire for humans to be treated with compassion. Simply, W;t compares the desires of the heart with the needs of the heart.

Vivian tells the truth. She dies at the end. This was not, however, the point of the story. Her survival, or lack there of, was not necessary for the author to make her point. Vivian’s death is merely a dramatic part of the plot that the author segues to comment on the contrast between humanity with knowledge.

Vivian is a professor of literature, really hard to understand literature. She is a scholar at poetry but her life is anything but poetic. She is brilliant. She is strong. She is alone. She is hardened. She is proud. She pulls no punches. She is the anti-thesis of poetic. She is also sick with Stage IV ovarian cancer. Her sickness reveals the part of her she has oppressed: Her humanity.

Upon learning of her illness, her doctor, Dr. Kelekian, Chief of Medical Oncology asks if she is strong. She doesn’t hesitate when answering and agrees to an intense regime of cancer treatment. “Vivian: …All right. Significant contribution to knowledge. Eight cycles of chemotherapy. Give me the full dose, the full dose every time” (16).

The author uses this plot comment on the medical profession. The common belief is that doctors want to help people. The author does not deny this belief but rather asks: “What does ‘help’ mean?”

The author uses character profiles to illustrate help on two planes: humanity vs. medicine. The nurse portrays humanity. Initially, the author paints her as simple, efficient and cheery but then, in a twist of irony, she is the person that stays grounded throughout Vivian’s journey… all the way to the end. The attending doctor, Dr. Kelekian, is neutral if not bored. A clinician who is balanced between teaching and treating patients. The fellow, Jason Posner, is excited… not necessarily about curing Vivian of her cancer but because her illness and treatment opens the doors for research. The author uses him ...

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The irony lies in Vivian’s attitude toward the world for the majority of her life. The characters in the story show how academia and humanity are often at odds with each other. Vivian is the unsurprisingly the protagonist but Jason, surprisingly, is the antagonist. In a story where the protagnosit dies of cancer, the reader expects the cancer to be the antagonist. The author makes it clear that cancer and death are not the negative aspects of Vivian’s life.

Vivian performs a monologue regarding her treatment of her students. She demanded accuracy, intelligence and an ability to quickly grasp complex thought. She was merciless in her pursuit to educate the masses. (After overhearing students sarcastically using her teachings in everyday conversation.) “Vivian: That was a witty little exchange, I must admit. It showed mental acuity I would praise in poetic text. But I admired only the studied application of wit, not its spontaneous eruption” (62).

Similarly, Jason is merciless in his pursuit to use research to solve the problem of cancer. His intentions are altruistic but come at a price. His bedside manner is sometimes awkward and often carries a tone of heartlessness.

Vivian’s profession intricately ties into the author’s commentary on the medical profession. She is an authority on poetry written in the 17th Cetnury. At the beginning of the play she claims that her knowledge of Donne’s The Holy Sonnets has educated her on the nature of both. The author uses Donne’s Holy Sonnet X throughout the play. The Sonnet, in its entirety, reads:

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so ;
For those, whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy picture[s] be,
Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.
Thou'rt slave to Fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,
And better than thy stroke ; why swell'st thou then ?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And Death shall be no more ; Death, thou shalt die.”

She claims that Donne’s writings and exploration of death and human sin and the request for redemption is now her own story. She claims that her education has prepared her for the intricacies of life and death. She was wrong.

As her illness progresses she experiences the horrors of her treatment. She comments on the irony of this. Her illness is not making her ill… her treatment is. She explores this conundrum and discovers that her strength is exploited for the benefit of others: That the strength that allows her to tolerate and persevere through this treatment will not benefit her. She will die.

She ponders the literary phrase; “How are you feeling today?” This phrase is used superfluously in daily life. She asks if anyone really wanted a true answer. She thinks not.

Jason: Professor Bearing. How are you feeling?

Vivian: Fine.

Jason: That’s great. That’s just great. (35-36).

The author uses the character Jason to paint the picture of the head outweighing the heart.

The author creates an emotional conflict between Jason and Vivian. He took her class. He did well. Very few students do well in Vivian’s class. She is proud of Jason. She educated him. She helped him become who he is. His character is very similar to Vivian’s. He can’t see his patients as people, but rather as a problem to be solved. Vivian could not see her students as people; but rather a mind to be educated. He is obsessed with cancer and the scientific anomaly it presents. Vivian was obsessed with the insidious difficulty of Donne’s Holy Sonnets and relished mastering them. Both lack feeling and both are overtly proud of their pathways in life. Both characters fall from grace through pride. The agony of Vivian’s treatment abolishes her pride. Jason’s reaction to Vivian’s death abolishes his.

At the culmination of the play when Vivian’s cancer and agony override her pride, she asks Jason about his career desires. He explains that he is not actually heartless but demonstrates that he is so tunnel-minded that he loses humanity.

Jason: (On cancer research)… I’ve got a couple idea, things I’m kicking around. Wait till I get a lab of my own. If I can survive this… fellowship.

Vivian: The part with the human beings.

Jason: Everybody’s got to go through it. All the great researchers. They want us to be able to converse intellectually with clinicians. As though researchers were the impediments. The clinicians are such troglodytes. So smary. Like we have to hold hands to discuss creatine clearance. Just cut the crap, I say. (57).

Vivian understands this and reflects on her life and her career.

The last twist of irony is in Vivian’s last and only visitor: her mentor. All throughout Vivian’s career she emulated her. She thought she was like her. The author uses the appearance of the mentor to demonstrate that a balance can be, must be, found between the head and heart. The act of heart from Vivian’s idealistic model of the head demonstrates the author’s call for balance.

Wit is a social commentary on the medical profession. It explains the necessity of balance between the head and the heart through irony and wit. The author balances the protagonist, Vivian, with the antagonist, Jason to demonstrate that medicine is somewhat patriarchal and lacks focus on the patient and, rather, focuses on the disease.

Work Cited:

Donne J. 2003 Jul 21. Holy Sonnet X: Death Be Not Proud. http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/866/. Accessed 2012 Nov 11.

Edson, M. (2001) W;t. New York: Farber.