CITY OF INCURABLE WOMEN

Hope Newhouse's sensitive performance of Maud Casey's phantasmagorical novel lingers long in the listener's imagination. Blending fact with fiction, the author explores the nineteenth-century phenomenon of women hospitalized with hysteria. Diagnosed by male doctors, the women had symptoms that included everything from anxiety, fainting, and irritability to insomnia, sexual desire, and loss of desire. With fictional portraits and actual case notes from Paris's Salpêtrière Hospital, Newhouse has created a haunting study of mysterious occurrences, individual agency, and power dynamics. Newhouse's light, precise voice and welcoming tone immediately engage listeners in the women's personal accounts, both straightforward and kaleidoscopic. Her impeccable French further increases the verisimilitude as listeners wander among these remarkably resilient women, their ghosts, and their stigmata. A.C.S. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine [Published: MARCH 2022]