Title: Speaking in hunger
First published: 1998
Description: In Speaking in Hunger, Donnalee Frega confronts the growing tendency in both popular and scholarly studies to view eating disorders as a secret and private form of negative self-expression "suffered" primarily by women. Drawing on history, clinical studies, and literature, Frega's comprehensive study approaches anorexia not as an illness, but as a dangerous strategy employed by healthy young people of both sexes against unrealistic expectations of perfection.

Frega examines in depth the three areas in which eating disorders are most likely to flourish: the home and family; society, particularly through friendships and romantic relationships; and the religious or spiritual realm. She illustrates her discussion with a lively reading of Samuel Richardson's compelling novel Clarissa, the psychologically realistic story of a "fasting" girl that evoked international outrage when it was published in 1748 and continues to impress scholars and therapists today.

The author considers the broad range of social and cultural factors that have defined "abnormal" eating practices throughout history, and she convincingly argues that when anorexia is viewed as an effective language that is learned and shared through family interaction (rather than as a hopeless attempt to repudiate life), much of its mystery is dispelled.
Subjects: Anorexia nervosa in literature, Body, Human, in literature, Discourse analysis, Literary, Eating disorders in literature, English Epistolary fiction, Epistolary fiction, English, History, History and criticism, Hunger in literature, Literary Discourse analysis, Power (Social sciences) in literature, Rape victims in literature, Women and literature, Women in literature, Femmes et litterature, Essstorung, Anorexie mentale dans la litterature, Human body in literature, Roman epistolaire anglais, Corps humain dans la litterature, Comportement alimentaire, Troubles du, dans la litterature, Clarissa (Richardson, Samuel), Histoire, Anorexia nervosa, Histoire et critique, Faim dans la litterature, Pouvoir (Sciences sociales) dans la litterature, Discours litteraire, Femmes dans la litterature, Richardson, samuel, 1689-1761, Epistolary fiction, history and criticism
Places: England
People: Samuel Richardson (1689-1761)
Time periods: 18th century