A student-led performance of student-written monologues provides medical students with a creative outlet and can be used by trainees across various settings to share personal stories, including mental health struggles, clinical experiences, and poetry—all while providing a space for community building.
As medical students, our lives often lack opportunities for creativity. mEmory Monologues is a unique theatrical performance started in 2021 by a group of Emory medical students, Meredith Kline, Sarah Gold, Sarah Gorvetzian, Jessica Reed and Julie Shabto, and has now become an annual event. This show was inspired by Eve Ensler’s award-winning play, The Vagina Monologues, an episodic play of personal monologues exploring femininity. After soliciting monologues about the medical experience from the Emory School of Medicine community, additional medical students select from among these pieces to memorize, rehearse, and perform in front of their peers. This opportunity to share our stories as medical students not only promotes creative expression in writing and acting, but also helps build community based on our common experiences. Topics have ranged from mental health struggles to comedic moments on clinical rotations, to poetry about finding beauty in our experiences. Admission is free, and we welcome all members of our community in!
This event works to benefit the community on a greater level. The first performance in 2021 requested donations to Nolan’s Fund, an organization that supports medical student mental health. In 2022, we donated to Lost-N-Found Youth, which works to end LGBTQ youth homelessness. This year’s closing piece “Here in the House that Osler Built,” written by Tim Niyogusaba (Class of 2023) and performed by David Ebhomielen (Class of 2024), presents a moving tribute to what you can lose in medical school, but also what can be found. More videos can be found at our YouTube page (https://www.youtube.com/@memorymonologues7272). We hope to produce this meaningful event for the health sciences community in years to come.
Here in the house that Osler built
Written by Tim Niyogusaba
Performed by David Ebhomielen
I came so far for beauty.
I left so much behind.
Here in the house that Osler built,
We sit by candlelight,
And often at dawn,
we sing the song of our suffering.
I came so far, for beauty,
And I left so much behind.
I wish I could still show you,
The imperfect anatomy of my brave heart
In the house that I had built, we spoke of joy,
With bounding laughter, wisdom and pride.
But in this house, we have a secret language
whispering our longing in heavy, caffeinated breaths.
I came so far for beauty,
And I left so much, behind.
Like the three old wise men,
following a miraculous guiding star, Northbound until Thessaly
Now no longer at ease, we take turns staring into the bright light
And only do as much as our weary bodies allow.
And for a fleeting moment, as I held new life in cold, double-gloved hands
I grasped the meaning of life
And when I sat next to a dying man,
behind a thin layer of fog,
the meaning of life left me.
I came so far for beauty,
And I left so much behind.
Exchanging all of my boundaries for wisdom,
I traded away belonging for rumination,
or as we call it, the healer’s pride
In this secret science, entropy rules and we are its subjects
Toiling away in a mist of pain, as alchemists of suffering.
Will we find ever our buried treasure?
Nobody seems to know
I came so far for beauty,
and beauty blinded me.
They say making my way back will take much longer this way
But still I walk,
With every step, my spirit is renewed
With every stumble, I am reborn
Finding at last,
that it is not our wings that make us beautiful,
But our scars.
Acknowledgments
The authors would once again like to thank all who helped in supporting mEmory Monologues including the Emory University School of Medicine Administration, Dr. Bill Eley, Dr. Hughes Evans, and Dr. Kimberly Manning.
Further, we would like to thank all students who submitted pieces and who performed. Special thanks to Tim Niyogusaba who wrote “Here in the house that Osler built” and David Ebhomielen who performed it.
The authors received no grant support for this work and declare no conflicts of interest.
Sarah Gold, BA
Medical Student, Emory University School of Medicine
Tim Niyogusaba, MD
Medical Graduate, Emory University School of Medicine
Jessica Reed, MD MPH
Medical Graduate, Emory University School of Medicine
JJ Myers, BA
Medical Student, Emory University School of Medicine
Jacqueline Comiter, BA
Medical Student, Emory University School of Medicine
Mariana C. Sanchez-Medina, BA
Medical Student, Emory University School of Medicine, mariana.sanchez-medina@emory.edu