"Offering a rigorous analysis of how imaginative fiction can both diagnose and resist systemic injustice, Decolonizing Disease draws on a striking range of contemporary international literary voices to trace the racialised, environmental and (neo)colonial dimensions of pandemics mapping continuities between the Spanish flu pandemic, HIV/AIDS, Ebola, and Covid-19. Opening up future-facing narrative possibilities, the analysis will provide readers with a compelling and vital account of literatures power to critique, heal, and reworld public health crises." - Susheila Nasta FRSL MBE, Professor of Modern Literatures and Founding Editor of Wasafiri Magazine "In Decolonizing Disease, Claire Chambers offers a thoughtful re-examination of how we understand pandemics, public health, and the stories we tell about them. By combining literary studies, postcolonial theory, and medical humanities she reveals how narratives of disease are profoundly shaped by - and in turn shape - systems of power, inequality, and colonial legacy." - Amitav Ghosh With her far-reaching and impassioned new book, Decolonising Disease, Claire Chambers draws bold connections between modern pandemics and their social impacts from Covid-19 to HIV/AIDS, Ebola, and flu and explores the leading role fiction can play in understanding and critiquing these shocks. Chambers argues that the power of pathogenic fiction lies in its ability to expose how health crises exacerbate and multiply inequality. At the same time, she persuasively shows how the novel can open up renewed possibilities in an era dominated by racialised capitalism and corporate interest. - Professor Elleke Boehmer, Professor of World Literature in English, University of Oxford, and Director, Oxford Centre for Life Writing
