From the Publisher
This is a wonderful, poignant, and personal journey into the world of hypochondria. We stand with Crampton on the precipice, where a small shift in perception can plunge us into an overwhelming dread of illness. Written with wisdom and insight, this is both an important and entertaining read into a much-misunderstood condition.” — Dr. Alastair Santhouse, author of Head First
“Caroline Crampton takes us on a tour of her own personal vortex in this thoughtful and touching examination of what it means to be well. While her central metaphor is glass—with all its implications of fragility, brittleness, and shattered sharp edges—Crampton’s unflinching honesty and skill with words make for a tender and often heart-breaking history of medicine. Every medical professional should read this book.” — Subhadra Das, author of Uncivilised
“A Body Made of Glass is a masterful and very readable account of the history of hypochondria as a concept in human history, and its implications for how we think about what is real, what is normal, and how we relate to our bodies. And the writing is beautiful. This is a profound work, especially when Crampton weaves in her own story of illness anxiety and trauma. I read it at a sitting.” — Dr. Gwen Adshead, author of The Devil You Know
“Clarity and beauty combine with terror and dark comedy—essential reading for everyone who has a body. And yes—that means every single reader in the world.” — Lucy Worsley, author of Agatha Christie
“Moving and fascinating. By combining her own experiences with a reflective and insightful study of hypochondria’s history, Crampton has created a unique exploration of the condition. Hypochondria, and the plight of those who live with it, has long deserved more attention. A Body Made of Glass is a surprising, uplifting, and compelling book that will, I hope, put that right.” — Michael Brooks, author of The Art of More
“A compassionate, erudite, and humane exploration of our greatest anxieties. If you've ever had sleepless nights worrying about your health, this definitive history of hypochondria is for you.” — Jules Montague, author of The Imaginary Patient
“An intelligent, vulnerable, and learned book about a condition so widespread and yet so misunderstood. A Body Made of Glass unpicks the mysterious relationship between mind, body, and a health anxiety that may or may not have a physical source. Crampton's personal history makes her perfectly qualified to adjudicate the ultimate question: is it all in the mind? Her answers are humane, thoughtful, and unsettling. The best book I've read in ages.” — Cal Flyn, author of Islands of Abandonment
“A fascinating history of health anxiety, from Hippocrates to Dr. Google.” — Guardian
“Poetic and personal, this book reveals a condition that is debilitating and often hidden.” — Kirkus
“Hypochondria has a long history, yet it is perhaps the quintessential condition of our times. Crampton has written a thoughtful, affecting examination of what it’s like to own a body in an anxious era.” — Florence Williams, author of The Nature Fix and Heartbreak
“In this riveting, genre-bending memoir, journalist Crampton traces the cultural and historical lineage of hypochondria. . . [A] stimulating and rigorous take on a slippery subject.” — Publishers Weekly
"A truly fascinating foray into the theories, origins, history, and treatment of a too-often maligned disorder that cries out for less judgment and more empathy." — Booklist (starred review)
“Hypochondria, [Crampton] finds, offer a rich and nebulous tradition, binding her to two millennia of people led around in circles by their own bodies.” — Harpers
“Engaging. . . . With extensive experience in the worlds of the medically explained and the medically unexplained, Crampton is perfectly placed to write this fascinating and intelligent cultural history of health anxiety, suffused with the intensity of feeling that hypochondria ignites, as well as the insight that it often precludes.” — Guardian
"Crampton dissects each of [the book's] questions with care and nuance…[A Body Made of Glass] ranges comprehensively not only through the history of hypochondria, but also through hypochondria’s appearances in books and culture…I found myself bringing up the book to nearly everyone I spoke to during the time I was reading it, both because I found it fascinating and because it contained some element I felt would appeal to each person’s specific interests." — Brooklyn Rail
“A Body Made of Glass is a product of impressively thorough research…full of fascinating forays.” — Washington Post
“Moving…[An] exhaustively researched cultural history of health anxiety…[Crampton] is an evocative writer, capable of elegant description and astute analysis, and she captures the ambiguities and contradictions of health anxiety…Crampton sets out to chase this condition through history. She not only succeeds, but ends up posing intriguing and potentially important questions.” — New Scientist
“Crampton is an elegant, perceptive writer...What [she discovers] in the history of hypochondria sheds provocative light on our evolving thinking about the relationship between mind and body.” — Salon
“A Body Made of Glass provides an intimate, honest, willingly vulnerable exploration into a very sticky question: When it comes to health and sickness, what is real and what is imaginary? More importantly, who decides?....[The book is] an act of solidarity against the inscrutability of our own biological processes....Whether that which pains us is in body or in mind, our feelings and impressions about it matter. We are all facing mortality together, and Ms. Crampton’s last words of comfort are also the most honest: ‘I am ill and I am well. I am still here.’” — Wall Street Journal
“A beguiling new book. . . [Crampton’s] thought process is sort of a magical, trippy experience, with a whiff of Alice in Wonderland nibbling the magic mushroom.” — New York Times
"The timing of the writer Caroline Crampton’s new book, A Body Made of Glass: A Cultural History of Hypochondria, couldn’t be better. . . [A] belletristic account of hypochondria’s long and twisting lineage." — Atlantic
“I loved the book—it's a wide-ranging, relentlessly curious cultural history exploring everything from John Donne's hypochondriacal writing to the author's personal life with hypochondria since recovering from cancer.” — John Green
“[A] thought-provoking exploration of hypochondria...[A] portrait of a condition that, though nearly as old as recorded human history, continues to elude neat definition, even as it raises urgent questions about ‘who is believed when they speak of their pain, and who is not.’” — New Yorker
Kirkus Reviews
2024-01-04
An up-to-date study of hypochondria, which has been around for centuries but has become more widespread in the digital age.
In her adolescent years, Crampton, author of The Way to the Sea, had a serious encounter with blood cancer. After grueling treatment, she recovered, but the experience left her with hypochondria, the elusive and exhausting feeling that every minor pain or change in her body was a sign of approaching disaster. This book is her attempt to understand the condition. As she embarked on her research, the author discovered that the condition is surprisingly common. At the most intense end of the scale are people whose lives have become severely limited, to the point that they will hardly leave their rooms for fear of contagion. At another level are those who will try any potion or procedure to cure an ailment that is entirely imaginary. Some hypochondriacs will begin to believe they have an illness because they have read about it or seen a documentary on it. The internet has been a major contributor to this phenomenon, writes the author. A “cyberchondriac,” she notes, “gets trapped in a never-ending spiral of increasingly doom-laden internet searches.” The rise of social media has seen the proliferation of so-called wellness specialists, who provide a remedy for whatever it is a person with a credit card thinks they have. As Crampton shows, there are serious attempts to treat hypochondria underway, and methods related to treatment for PTSD show promise. However, a real understanding of the condition is a long way off. As for herself, Crampton believes that writing the book provided valuable perspective and insight into her own struggles. “I am ill and I am well,” she concludes. “I am still here.”
Poetic and personal, this book reveals a condition that is debilitating and often hidden.
