- Article
- Article
How I escaped my anxiety and depression through architecture and poetry
Social anxiety led him to introversion and silence. The brutalist architecture of London’s Barbican Estate inspired his liberation in poetry.
- Article
- Article
The poetic language of health
When his doctors could only offer phone consultations, James Morland turned to poetry to make sense of the medical terms describing his symptoms and test results.
- Article
- Article
How electromagnetic therapy inspired me
Poet Sarah James explores how repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation treated her depression and influenced her art.
- Article
- Article
Lovesickness and ‘The Love Thief’
An 11th-century poem of love, lust and possibly gruesome death still resonates today.
- Article
- Article
The eye of darshan
The Hindu concept of darshan means “divine revelation”, but it’s also about the multilayered ways in which we see the world around us. Adrian Plau explains how one image in a Panjabi manuscript relates to darshan, and why it’s so striking.
- Article
- Article
Writing back to authority
As she cuts up old doctors’ letters and uses them to compose absurd poems, Caroline Butterwick reflects on the catharsis of creation and proposes writing as a way to take back control.
- Article
- Article
On contagion
Reading descriptions of the way humans become infested by parasitic flatworms, Daisy Lafarge experienced painful physical symptoms. Perhaps the very creature she was studying had invaded her body.
- Article
- Article
Talent, tech and visual art
Jamie Hale finds a combination of talent and technology are crucial when it comes to creating great visual art, but how do you keep working when your circumstances are in constant flux?
- Article
- Article
We are from here, but not from here
Novelist JJ Bola on being a refugee with a British passport and what that placenessless means for a search for identity.
- Article
- Article
“Everybody desires a degree of independence”
I’m 26, and building a network of friends and my career. Unlike most people my age, I’m entirely dependent on carers to achieve this.
- Prose poem
- Prose poem
Intrinsic Evanescence
Will Alexander on the poetry of the rarefied atmosphere of a friendship.
- Article
- Article
Kathryn Mannix’s prescription for writing
The Wellcome Book Prize shortlisted author of ‘With the End in Mind’ answers five questions on health, inspiration and storytelling.
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- Article
Ken’s ten: looking back at ten years of Wellcome Collection
Wellcome Collection founder Ken Arnold picks his favourite exhibits.
- Article
- Article
How the Peckham Experiment inspired my fiction
Find out how an unruly mass of archive material from a 1930s radical health centre has inspired brand new writing.
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- Article
Surviving grief when discussing death is off limits
When Iqra Choudhry’s dad died, she lost her words. Here she explains how finding a way to talk and write about loss has been essential for surviving it.
- Article
- Article
Coleridge’s hypochondria
An intense focus on his own bodily sensations led poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge to self-medicate with narcotics. But this fascination also put Coleridge ahead of the medical sensibilities of his day.
- Article
- Article
Another way to listen
Background noise is something we often try to ignore. Adjoa Wiredu explores what happens if we intentionally choose to tune in.
- Article
- Article
Autistic togetherness during lockdown
While lockdown has presented autistic people with greater challenges than life pre-COVID, many have found strength and comfort in the situation. Autistic writer and performer Kate Fox explains how.
- Interview
- Interview
Meet the climate emergency
Find out what led Yinka Shonibare to create the compelling artwork ‘Refugee Astronaut’.
- Article
- Article
Words of hope and anger
Author and spoken word poet Penny Pepper remembers her childhood dreams, and speaks out against the barriers society uses to prevent disabled people from fulfilling their potential.
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- Article
Confronting male stereotypes in the classroom
Sometimes men just don’t like football. Writer and teacher Okechukwu Nzelu decides to be himself in front of his students.
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- Article
The intermediate life of spirits
Courttia Newland explores the events and his feelings surrounding the death of his mother-in-law, Tara Chauhan.
- Article
- Article
Wonder Woman’s wonder women
Discover more about the women who inspired an icon: Wonder Woman’s story of bondage, bracelets and birth control.
- Article
- Article
Rag mags and monthly issues: Five period zines to stop you seeing red
Using humour, personal experience and political activism to explore the bloody reality of menstruation.
- Article
- Article
Air of threat
Novelist Chloe Aridjis vividly describes the suffocating atmosphere of Mexico City, as a combination of topography, crowded neighbourhoods, and reckless political diktats create a downward spiral.