Judith Hoare in Psyche:
Imagine being in a pandemic, isolated and inert. Your life feels out of control, and you are stressed, not sleeping well. Then a raft of bewildering new symptoms arrive – perhaps your heart races unexpectedly, or you feel lightheaded. Maybe your stomach churns and parts of your body seem to have an alarming life of their own, all insisting something is badly wrong. You are less afraid of the pandemic than of the person you have now become.
Most terrifying of all is the invasive flashes of fear in the absence of any specific threat.
Back in 1927, this was 24-year-old Claire Weekes. A brilliant young scholar on her way to becoming the first woman to attain a doctorate of science at the University of Sydney,
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