Shìjiàn

In 1963, 23-year-old, unmarried Anne Ernault discovered she was pregnant. Shame washed over her, she knew her unwanted pregnancy would make her and her family social failures, and she knew she couldn't keep the child. Forty years later, Ernault wrote this story, recounting the trauma she never overcame. In France, where abortion was criminalized at the time, she attempted to perform the procedure herself using knitting needles, but to no avail. Fearful and desperate, she finally sought out an underground doctor, only to be rushed to a hospital emergency room, where she nearly died.