Abstract: Taking into account an increasingly widespread and public awareness of oncological diseases (in various national contexts) and using my own experience with testicular cancer as a starting point, this project analyses cancer from an artistic, aesthetic and cultural point of view. It focuses on the techniques and tools used by authors and directors from the Portuguese-speaking world to portray and discuss cancer from an intersectional and “teratological” perspective (Stacey, 1997).

In particular, Portuguese poetry and Brazilian cinema are covered, where a particular “oncological turn” can be noted, due to the emergence of a considerable body of relevant works: these are poems and films that not only describe and narrate the diagnostic, surgical and therapeutic process of cancer patients but also question, problematise and even queer the liminal positioning that this disease entails. In this seminar, I will provide close-readings of some poetic and cinematic examples from Portugal and Brazil.