Disease and Suffering: Afterthoughts

Whenever I think of texts where disease features prominently, the illness always has a larger symbolic meaning, a comment on the human condition. Think for example Beth’s death in Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women or Eva in Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Can you think of a text where illness features prominently but does not serve as a metaphor or symbol? Where it is merely circumstantial or treated purely as material?

-Amreeta