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A review by girlreactionreads
Portrait of a Body by Julie Delporte
challenging
dark
hopeful
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
4.0
1) the art in this graphic... whatever it is (more next)... is really gorgeous. The drawings (paintings?) combined with the somewhat childlike cursive/print combo is really unique. It feels nostalgic, and dreamy.
2) I guess this isn't quite a memoir or a biography. But it's sort of that. It's the author's reflections on the incidents in life that led her to question her gender, question her levels of sexual being-ness, question where she belonged, where she didn't, where she doesn't.
3) It's another Drawn & Quarterly purchase. People. If you like graphic novels, graphic nonfiction, graphic anything, get your butt over there. Everything they produce is so so so high quality and lovely.
4) That said, I did find a "typo" in the handwriting. The curse of being a natural speller. It's hard to slip those past me.
5) I can't speak to whether the translation was good or not, but I can say that it didn't paper over the original too thickly. What I mean is, despite is being written in perfectly fine English, there was some lingering sense of another language hanging behind it. The word choices, the syntax... it was perfectly fine English and yet not perfectly expectable English. If you can ferret out my meaning from that. (Good luck.)
6) Am I this book's target audience? Have I ever felt not at home in my body? I have certainly examined my body for deficiencies. I have certainly had critiques and confusions. But I don't think I've ever not known or questioned in this way. So I'd say this is a window book for me. But perhaps a quite valuable mirror book for people who thought they were alone in this.
7) Did I mention the art? There are some very Georgia O'Keefe vibes. There were moments that reminded me of Anneli Furmark's "Walk Me to the Corner" (another Drawn & Quarterly publication). The color palette was very evocative and I just loved looking at it.
2) I guess this isn't quite a memoir or a biography. But it's sort of that. It's the author's reflections on the incidents in life that led her to question her gender, question her levels of sexual being-ness, question where she belonged, where she didn't, where she doesn't.
3) It's another Drawn & Quarterly purchase. People. If you like graphic novels, graphic nonfiction, graphic anything, get your butt over there. Everything they produce is so so so high quality and lovely.
4) That said, I did find a "typo" in the handwriting. The curse of being a natural speller. It's hard to slip those past me.
5) I can't speak to whether the translation was good or not, but I can say that it didn't paper over the original too thickly. What I mean is, despite is being written in perfectly fine English, there was some lingering sense of another language hanging behind it. The word choices, the syntax... it was perfectly fine English and yet not perfectly expectable English. If you can ferret out my meaning from that. (Good luck.)
6) Am I this book's target audience? Have I ever felt not at home in my body? I have certainly examined my body for deficiencies. I have certainly had critiques and confusions. But I don't think I've ever not known or questioned in this way. So I'd say this is a window book for me. But perhaps a quite valuable mirror book for people who thought they were alone in this.
7) Did I mention the art? There are some very Georgia O'Keefe vibes. There were moments that reminded me of Anneli Furmark's "Walk Me to the Corner" (another Drawn & Quarterly publication). The color palette was very evocative and I just loved looking at it.