Poets Anne Carson and Richard Siken Confront Language Loss Through Neurodegenerative Conditions
In a 2024 essay, poet Anne Carson shared her diagnosis of Parkinson's disease, highlighting its effects on her handwriting. She further elaborated on the disease's influence on brain genes and dopamine in a 2025 update for the London Review of Books. Now in her seventies, Carson contemplates her own mortality. Richard Siken's 2025 work, I Do Know Some Things, narrates his experience with a stroke that erased his memory and grammatical skills, prompting him to reconstruct language during his recovery. Siken's poetry delves into instances where language falters. Both poets reflect on how neurodegeneration shapes reality and metaphor. Carson has explored this theme since 'The Glass Essay' (1994). Joseph Osmundson published the contrasting examination of their writing and experiences with loss on April 5, 2026.
Key facts
- Anne Carson detailed her Parkinson's disease experience in a 2024 essay, with an update in 2025 for the London Review of Books
- Richard Siken's 2025 book I Do Know Some Things recounts his stroke and language loss recovery
- Carson describes Parkinson's as degrading her handwriting, which she calls her primary mode of thinking
- Siken's stroke erased his memory and knowledge of grammar, leading him to rebuild language from scratch
- Carson has written about neurodegeneration since at least 1994's 'The Glass Essay', addressing her father's dementia
- Siken's poems in the collection include 'Metonymy', 'Bed', 'Landmark', 'Strata', 'Volta', and 'Beet Soup'
- Parkinson's involves dopamine neuron loss in the substantia nigra brain region and misfolded alpha-synuclein protein
- The essay was published on April 5, 2026 by Joseph Osmundson, a scientist and writer
Entities
Artists
- Anne Carson
- Richard Siken
- Joseph Osmundson
- René Descartes
- Alois Alzheimer
- Michael Silverblatt
- André Aciman
- Joni Mitchell
- Alesha Sivartha
- Pria Anand
- Michael Erard
Institutions
- London Review of Books
- LARB
- Bloomsbury
- Lambda Literary
- National Book Critics Circle
Locations
- London
- United Kingdom
- Pacific Ocean