["Workpeople in general are healthier [...] than the masters". Experience of illness and masculinity in autobiographies of workpeople].

Abstract

Workers' autobiographies of the late 19th and early 20th centuries depict, at length, diseases both in terms of physical description and impact, and in terms of psychological effects. Drastic physical defects and their consequences are explicitly described. Many writers appear weak against the primary presumption of the strong, male body of the workers. Mourning and dejection over the authors' own weaknesses and the illnesses of others (relatives and colleagues) are prevalent. However, the masculinity of the first-person narrator, in principle, is not eclipsed or overshadowed by doubt because of disease and weakened physical condition. Diseases are metaphors for bad social conditions which lead to weakness, whilst the authors succeeded in coping with their weaknesses by compensating with other abilities and talents.