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A review by alexisrt
Golem Girl: A Memoir by Riva Lehrer
5.0
This was an outstanding memoir that deserves much more publicity than it seems to have had.
Riva Lehrer was born with lipomyelomeningocele, a form of spina bifida, in 1958--just when surgeons were beginning to operate on infants rather than waiting to see if they could survive. Her first two years were spent in Cincinnati Children's Hospital, before her parents were finally able to take her home. Since then, she's had dozens of surgeries. These things are important to know, but they are not who Riva Lehrer is. Her story is not just her disability, but her art, her family, and her activism, all inseparable.
Lehrer's story is one of identity: how she developed as a woman, as an artist, as a queer person, and as a disabled person, and how all those identities have intersected: the disabled are frequently desexualized, and her work as an artist has often focused on portraying disabled people. She discusses, openly and frankly, how society sees her and people like her. The book contains quite a few of her portraits, and for this reason I recommend getting the paper edition (or if you must read it as an ebook, do so on a good quality color tablet).
What marks the memoir is her glorious sense of compassion and sensitivity. Her parents, especially her mother, both loved her deeply and would have done anything for her, but were overprotective. Carole Horwitz Lehrer gave up a medical research career to have children; it was probably her actions that saved Riva's life and kept her from being institutionalized. At the same time, Carole dominated her daughter's life and made devastating medical decisions on her behalf. Riva is able to treat the complexity of her relationship with her mother, and her mother's own physical problems, with uncommon grace.
Her writing also shows the same care as her portraiture. There's a remarkable level of detail and precision, especially when discussing her family. The book is not funny, but Lehrer reveals herself as a person of great warmth and humor.
Although the book is not directly about religion at all, this is also a distinctly Jewish story, from her imagery of herself as the golem to the Jewish culture she was steeped in--adding yet another facet to her identity.
Riva Lehrer was born with lipomyelomeningocele, a form of spina bifida, in 1958--just when surgeons were beginning to operate on infants rather than waiting to see if they could survive. Her first two years were spent in Cincinnati Children's Hospital, before her parents were finally able to take her home. Since then, she's had dozens of surgeries. These things are important to know, but they are not who Riva Lehrer is. Her story is not just her disability, but her art, her family, and her activism, all inseparable.
Lehrer's story is one of identity: how she developed as a woman, as an artist, as a queer person, and as a disabled person, and how all those identities have intersected: the disabled are frequently desexualized, and her work as an artist has often focused on portraying disabled people. She discusses, openly and frankly, how society sees her and people like her. The book contains quite a few of her portraits, and for this reason I recommend getting the paper edition (or if you must read it as an ebook, do so on a good quality color tablet).
What marks the memoir is her glorious sense of compassion and sensitivity. Her parents, especially her mother, both loved her deeply and would have done anything for her, but were overprotective. Carole Horwitz Lehrer gave up a medical research career to have children; it was probably her actions that saved Riva's life and kept her from being institutionalized. At the same time, Carole dominated her daughter's life and made devastating medical decisions on her behalf. Riva is able to treat the complexity of her relationship with her mother, and her mother's own physical problems, with uncommon grace.
Her writing also shows the same care as her portraiture. There's a remarkable level of detail and precision, especially when discussing her family. The book is not funny, but Lehrer reveals herself as a person of great warmth and humor.
Although the book is not directly about religion at all, this is also a distinctly Jewish story, from her imagery of herself as the golem to the Jewish culture she was steeped in--adding yet another facet to her identity.