Washing the Dishes: Anne Boyer's The Undying

Abstract

<p>'Cancer messed with the wrong bitch' is an actual phrase printed on real t-shirts. 'You got this' is something people say to acquaintances who announce their diagnoses on Instagram. Both slogans intend to cast the sick person as the victor of a battle, but the battle doesn't really exist. Moreover, as toneless words on a page, 'you got this' can signify the fact that one has cancer, and that cancer messing with the wrong woman might mean she will die quickly—prematurely taking the tumours down with her. When Steve Jobs was first diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, so says Wikipedia, he believed he could somehow control the disease himself and delayed chemotherapy treatment to take up meditation and juicing. Meanwhile, Belle Gibson, an Australian cancer blogger duped thousands of people into believing she cured her brain cancer with food, and momentarily made a living from the lie.</p>