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4.14 AVERAGE
4.14 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
medium-paced
“Why be happy when you could be normal?”
The title - the response J. Winterson receives as she comes out to her adoptive mother.
The book - an unmeasured, neurotically studied response to that same question.
The themes of the book crossed one another, insistently toe-stepping, as J. Winterson chronicles her life: birth, love, mothers, happiness and its demands, her time at oxford and small intervals of socioeconomic, mancunian gloss.
Throughout, Mrs Winterson, her adoptive mother, surveys: the giantess who begins and homes the novel, her presence hedged in all avenues the novel takes. Despite how appalling her actions are, J. Winterson recants and justifies it all with respect, an attempt to understand.
I particularly enjoyed how she talks about literature, the scarcity of it and its comfort as a life-line in her most trying times - an explicit rebellion and escape from her adoptive mother’s indignant misery. It felt like an explanation, both of her previous works and herself.
Within the book she talks a lot about counterparts - an other ; sometimes in reference to severed plato-like soulmates, other times the crib from which Mrs W’s is led astray, someone before and after loss. The book is itself a counterpart. A step-child, born of understanding its own immeasurable loss integrated at birth. A shadow of her critically acclaimed debut novel ‘Oranges are not the only fruit’, the parallels of which are called upon and exhumed in morbid detail.
Yet this book continues on: the closing line, I have no Idea what happens next.
Unlike Oranges, a papered conclusion to the small northern town that made her, Why be happy moves on, for better or for worse. The book is restless, undone and exhaustingly present, part-child grasping for reason on love and life, part-grown - to a point where resignation and forgetfulness doesn’t deal with what lies under.
There was gravity in its motion - thoughts, understandings and pasts hatched over to urgently tell you something, not a story, not an end.
“Reading yourself as a fiction as well as a fact is the only way to keep the narrative open.”
The title - the response J. Winterson receives as she comes out to her adoptive mother.
The book - an unmeasured, neurotically studied response to that same question.
The themes of the book crossed one another, insistently toe-stepping, as J. Winterson chronicles her life: birth, love, mothers, happiness and its demands, her time at oxford and small intervals of socioeconomic, mancunian gloss.
Throughout, Mrs Winterson, her adoptive mother, surveys: the giantess who begins and homes the novel, her presence hedged in all avenues the novel takes. Despite how appalling her actions are, J. Winterson recants and justifies it all with respect, an attempt to understand.
I particularly enjoyed how she talks about literature, the scarcity of it and its comfort as a life-line in her most trying times - an explicit rebellion and escape from her adoptive mother’s indignant misery. It felt like an explanation, both of her previous works and herself.
Within the book she talks a lot about counterparts - an other ; sometimes in reference to severed plato-like soulmates, other times the crib from which Mrs W’s is led astray, someone before and after loss. The book is itself a counterpart. A step-child, born of understanding its own immeasurable loss integrated at birth. A shadow of her critically acclaimed debut novel ‘Oranges are not the only fruit’, the parallels of which are called upon and exhumed in morbid detail.
Yet this book continues on: the closing line, I have no Idea what happens next.
Unlike Oranges, a papered conclusion to the small northern town that made her, Why be happy moves on, for better or for worse. The book is restless, undone and exhaustingly present, part-child grasping for reason on love and life, part-grown - to a point where resignation and forgetfulness doesn’t deal with what lies under.
There was gravity in its motion - thoughts, understandings and pasts hatched over to urgently tell you something, not a story, not an end.
“Reading yourself as a fiction as well as a fact is the only way to keep the narrative open.”
It's amazing what humans can put other humans through, and amazing what we can survive.
I remember picking up a copy of Oranges (the fiction Winterson wrote on the real events from her life chronicled here) years ago and being intrigued--and horrified. So much more so with this autobiography.
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
fast-paced
emotional
funny
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
This was the nicest thing I've read in a long time. Jeanette Winterson is so hopeful. You really start to understand how one's life is both reality and fiction, and how emotional time (or real time, as she calls it) doesn't follow linear time but jumps around in unexpected places. I really agreed with all that she said about love: how we need to learn how to love, and how to be loved, and that that is both the meaning and the measure of a life. There was just so much in this book that really stood out and made sense to me: I really, really recommend it to everyone and plan to read her other books this christmas.
I've always chosen happy over normal.
I've always chosen happy over normal.
3,5 avrundat uppåt pga så himla mycket igenkänning i känslostormarna.
challenging
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
A short memoir from the author of Oranges are not the Only Fruit (which was semi autobiographical in nature).
There was a point in the first half of the book, where I wondered whether I'd end up highlighting the entire book.
It is packed full of philosophical insights, witty observations and is quite funny too despite the challenging subject matter.
In essence, this book revisits JW's life pre and post Oranges, ie the odd upbringing, and staid home of her highly religious parents. Jeanette is a lesbian and this causes much angst for her mother, eventually throwing her out at a young age. The book's title is a phrase her mother uses when Jeanette tries to explain that she's happy and in love.
JW talks about the impact of the industrial revolution, class division, the Thatcher era, and lack of money in Accrington. She's constantly dreaming of escape. Books are her means of escape- as it turns out, literally.
What I enjoyed most about the book is the stream of consciousnes style of writing, its brutal honesty, and the way JW deals with complex and nuanced themes ( such as religion and mental health) in a sensitive and often funny way. I also liked the fact that books and writing are central to this book and her life. Books are her salvation and there's quotes from poets and prose throughout, despite never being allowed book herself (not that it stopped her - JW was a rebel).
Jeanette was adopted by the Wintersons from birth; the latter part of the book is about her trying to find out about her roots and by doing so understand herself more. I enjoyed the latter part less in all honesty.
In summary, it's an interesting read particularly for those who like Oranges and want to read more about JW and her life before and after her mother's influence.
"A tough life needs a tough language- and that is what poetry is. That is what literature offers - a language powerful enough to say how it is. It isn't a hiding place. It is a finding place."
There was a point in the first half of the book, where I wondered whether I'd end up highlighting the entire book.
It is packed full of philosophical insights, witty observations and is quite funny too despite the challenging subject matter.
In essence, this book revisits JW's life pre and post Oranges, ie the odd upbringing, and staid home of her highly religious parents. Jeanette is a lesbian and this causes much angst for her mother, eventually throwing her out at a young age. The book's title is a phrase her mother uses when Jeanette tries to explain that she's happy and in love.
JW talks about the impact of the industrial revolution, class division, the Thatcher era, and lack of money in Accrington. She's constantly dreaming of escape. Books are her means of escape- as it turns out, literally.
What I enjoyed most about the book is the stream of consciousnes style of writing, its brutal honesty, and the way JW deals with complex and nuanced themes ( such as religion and mental health) in a sensitive and often funny way. I also liked the fact that books and writing are central to this book and her life. Books are her salvation and there's quotes from poets and prose throughout, despite never being allowed book herself (not that it stopped her - JW was a rebel).
Jeanette was adopted by the Wintersons from birth; the latter part of the book is about her trying to find out about her roots and by doing so understand herself more. I enjoyed the latter part less in all honesty.
In summary, it's an interesting read particularly for those who like Oranges and want to read more about JW and her life before and after her mother's influence.
"A tough life needs a tough language- and that is what poetry is. That is what literature offers - a language powerful enough to say how it is. It isn't a hiding place. It is a finding place."
emotional
fast-paced