Elevate Difference

Reviews tagged autobiography

The Truth about Me: A Hijra Life Story

What is it about the form of the life story—the autobiography—that makes it so seductive and so deeply discomfiting at the same time? I think it’s how the boundaries between private and public, someone else’s life and your own, blur in your reading. The relationship you forge is rich and colorful and insightful, but it’s also dark and violent and difficult to come to terms with.

Iona Dreaming: The Healing Power of Place

I felt deeply uncomfortable while reading Clare Cooper Marcus’ Iona Dreaming. Too uncomfortable, I thought—like eavesdropping on a stranger’s conversation with a long-lost friend.

Secret Weirdo

Well, for a twenty-page minicomic that is filled with embarrassing stories about childhood, cat police, imaginary adventures, and an opening page offering “free hugs,” artist Lauren Barnett definitely set herself up for a difficult task. One of her biggest pet peeves as a female artist is having her comics be called cute.

In the Beginning, Woman Was the Sun: The Autobiography of a Japanese Feminist

In the beginning, woman was truly the sun. An authentic person. Now she is the moon, a wan and sickly moon, dependent on another, reflecting another’s brilliance. _ _... The time has come for us to recapture the sun hidden within us. These lines launched Seitō, a women's literary journal, in 1911 Tokyo. Hiratsuka Raichō was one of the founders, and she poured her emotions into this opening editorial.

Acts of Narrative Resistance: Women's Autobiographical Writings in the Americas

Laura Beard’s study of women’s autobiography in its many forms, Acts of Narrative Resistance, is quite unique. There has to my knowledge never been a thorough single author study written which connected and compared such a variety of autobiographical texts from the Americas in Spanish, Portuguese, and English.

Louder Than Words: Emily

There were two things that drew me to this book. Firstly, the title is Emily and, hey, that’s my name, too! Secondly, and more importantly, the story revolves around a young girl called Emily whose life is plagued by physical illnesses, which she endearingly calls “Emily flu.” Could this book possibly be written about me? Alas, whilst I just suffer from chronic hypochondria, literary Emily has a genuine disease; the rare and incurable West Nile Virus.

Not That Kind of Girl

Carlene Bauer was a seven-year-old child when her mother became a born-again Christian, catapulting the family into a regimen that put avoiding devilish distraction front and center.

Cooking Dirty: A Story of Life, Sex, Love and Death in the Kitchen

My initial reaction after reading this book was to hurl it across the room and never see it again. Dramatic? A bit, yet justifiable. In an autobiographical narration, Jason Sheehan attempts to merge his experience as a cook with being a writer, but fails miserably. Cooking Dirty is not your average tale of a typical award-winning chef. There’s no culinary school or classical training involved, just the lessons he learned from the School of Hard Knocks.

Live Nude Elf: The Sexperiments of Reverend Jen

Reverend Jen Miller—artist, troll museum proprietor, elf-ear wearer, and reverend in the Universal Life Church—reprints and adapts the essays she wrote during her two-year stint as the writer for Nerve.com’s "I Did it for Science" column in Live Nude Elf: The Sexperiments of Reverend Jen. As the name suggests, the essays feature Miller performing experiments related to sex on herself and her friends.

Will Work for Drugs

I have always wanted to like Lydia Lunch. I’ve always admired her assertiveness and her dark attitude, and at times, even her severely sarcastic wit.

In and Out of the Working Class

To be perfectly honest, I have not read any of Michael Yates’ other work, and only know his name as a radical economist. I was interested in In and Out of the Working Class to see how he would turn his lens of analysis on his own life, in hopes that he would not only tell his own story, but illuminate the world that we all inhabit.

Life Lived in Reverse

Who says a woman can’t do anything she puts her mind to? Lucille M. Griswold’s memoir, Life Lived in Reverse, is written proof that dreams are attainable. This small volume is structured so that each chapter resembles a standalone essay. I found myself thinking of them as life lessons.

Spell Albuquerque: Memoir of a “Difficult” Student

I found Tennessee Reed’s memoir of her educational and professional life to be inspiring and informative.

Once You Go Back: A Novel

Once You Go Back is a poignant and semi-autobiographical novel about a young man and his quest for identity as he grows up in a dysfunctional working-class household.

Personal Moments in the Lives of Victorian Women: Selections from Their Autobiographies (Book 1)

I have to admit that when I received my copy of Personal Moments in the Lives of Victorian Women, I wasn't exactly excited to snuggle up and read it from start to finish. The cover art is not particularly appealing, as it depicts an antique black and white photo of a rather serious and unhappy looking woman, and makes the book look about as inviting as a textbook.

A Short Life of Trouble: Forty Years in the New York Art World

Memoir can be a tricky genre, with nothing holding its premise together other than the author’s truth. In Marcia Tucker’s case, being an artist and curator also makes her one hell of a writer, a woman with a keen ability to spot details and covey her passion to a larger audience. A Short Life of Trouble is a breezy, enjoyable read as it traces Tucker’s fortuitous rise through the New York art scene, parallel with the surge of second wave feminism in the 1960s.

Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy: On Being an American Citizen

In this piece, Susan Griffin develops quite a substantial work by elaborating on tenants and beliefs behind "democracy" as a practice; she establishes a readable interpretation of democracy as it stands in today's world.

Grit and Tender Membrane

Both a teacher and an inspiration to women worldwide, Barrow received a Leeway grant to tour via motorcycle, tell her stories and hold workshops for other female survivors of sexual abuse. She advocates poetry as a way to express difficult moments, get her metaphorical demons out and as a means of catharsis and rebirth.
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